My grandfather used to tell a (true) story, I loved to listen to him and remember this so many times... A young man was in the University of Coimbra, one day he received a package from his mother, it has a letter with it "My son, I'm sending you a new shirt made from your father's old shirt. When it gets old send it back so I can make a new shirt for your brother. Love, your mother"
Many years ago, I was at a festival who had gotten a Scottish weaver for demonstrations - the weaver told us that in the real old days, if the house caught on fire, people would rescue the clothing and cloth, because it was quicker and cheaper to build a small wood house then replace the cloth.
Woolens and linens were very expensive before the invention of the power loom. I'd easily bore you explaining all the steps involved in making cloth from the plant or fleece. You can tell this based on dowries, wills and other documents.
@@cuttwice3905 I have a mad project to grow and process my own linen. I've barely started, and already I am VERY VERY CAREFUL with scraps of all sorts of fabric, because of how much effort (human or mechanical) is needed to make it!
Boredom is the curse of the trenches. Mending would actually be helpful for the inside of one's head as much as the outside of one's uniform. (I love Bernadette Banner's book! The way the paper feels is a positive delight.)
There are rumors that life on exoplanets will not be found by the JWST, but by a random seargant noticing a missing button on the 5th sleeve of a soldier on Tau Ceti e.
It depends on the SGT. I personally didn’t give a hoot if your hair/clothes weren’t 1000% within reg so long as you’re weren’t being blatant about it. I would kindly and discreetly point out anything that turned someone into bait for the people who had a real liking of being assholes when giving the chance though. Your backpack has a logo in a color that doesn’t fit reg, I couldn’t give less of a crap, hair a bit long but still well kept and professional not my concern we aren’t wearing gas masks any time soon. Wearing a comic book belt because you don’t anticipate anyone noticing, yeah you need to fix that one high speed.
The first thing my US Marine brother did when he came home from boot camp was iron his clothes. Even Viggo Mortisen an actor playing a literary fantasy character knew to make Aragon real he had to run around in his costume, rip it, and then repaired it by his own hand. Details like that make something real. Love your channel!!!!!!!!!
The whole bit about sergeants was absolutely hilarious to me, mostly because my great-grandad was Director of Artillery for Ireland and, despite only having one eye, was terrifyingly good at spotting stray specks of dust, let alone holes in uniform.
As a weaver, the idea someone would either spend the hours and hours to weave and construct something-or have to have the money to pay someone else to do it-and then just... not take care of it... is so crazy lol.
Ikr, I knit a pair of socks for a man who's 6'4" once. The idea that someone would just walk away from that kind of time investment is ludicrous. I didn't even spin my own yarn!
Ex British Soldier here, ten years service between 2007-2017. Sewing kits were never issued. We had to buy one from one of the shops on camp or make up our own kits. Never got any training in how to sew either. I think I was the only man in my section in basic training that purchased the sewing kit in a DPM pouch. Most squaddies will just take damaged items to the stores and ask for an exchange.
YES! I've seen so many (mostly guy) reenactors wearing torn, dirty, shredded clothes - and shoes! Yet my mom used to work at a living history museum, and she was one of the people folks who needed a quick patch or repair would seek out if they weren't confident to do it themselves. Like she'd send someone into a basement or upstairs that visitors didn't go into, he'd throw her his torn pants, and she'd fix them up lickety-split. She kept an extensive sewing kit - in housewife form! and including materials for patching sourced from the costuming dept - with her on station. There's no excuse for walking around in torn clothes unless you literally just tore them! It's ahistorical and sloppy!
Yes!!! So much this! I have a dress that I like to call "the never ending project". It started out as a 13th century pullover dress in 2009 or '10. After my pregnancy I opened it up in the front and put a lace in (for nursing), so now it is a 14th century dress. About a year later I ripped through my elbows, so I made it a short sleeved kirtle. After picking up and carrying around a growing toddler for three years or so, my arms, shoulders, back and bust didn't fit right anymore. I had kept all scraps of which I made new sleeves, but by that time the dress was about 9 years old and the color had faded. So I ripped it apart and turned it inside out, in order for the new sleeves to match the old dress! I've worn it another 3 years and then the backpanel gave out. It had seen a lot of repairs already, especially at the side seams with the strain of lacing it up, but now had simply been worn to thin to hold even one more stitch. I took my last bit of this wool I had left and put on a great big patch over the back, also covering the side seams, secured it well and then cut away the old worn bit on the inside of what now was a whole new back panel. I'm sure my dress is going to serve me well for another 5 years and more. Only then, I'll have to do my repairs in a different color fabric. Which I'm sure will only add to it's charm!
I have a book about the clothing of the Black Prince based on documents. One of the things was that one of the yearly payments for work done was a "suit of clothes " . Once a year you got clothing! Clothing also was handed down in wills, as well as sheets, blankets and tapestries. Fabric was EXPENSIVE! That was why making it was one of the first things industrialized. Tapestries ordered and hung by Henry VIII cost as much as a battle ship. A good linen shirt took an acre of land and a year to make. A viking ship sail took many women and sheep at least 2 years of work, in fact it took longer to spin and weave a sail then to build a boat.
@@kokofan50 it would probably take more then a few days lol when you have to create the planks without power tools. And you have create the nails and roves to stick them together.
@@lenabreijer1311 making the boards is the easiest part. You split the boards then hue them. Also, longboats only used a few nails at the stem and stern. The long part is carving the keel, but with a few dozen guys on a longboat crew, that much wouldn’t take long.
It's so good to see this post! I'm in a group in Australia called The Revolting Peasants and I make the special effort to patch and darn my gear. Partially because I'm cheap but mainly because repaired clothing looks great. Coincidentally, I'm currently patching one of my very old tunics again. Even in the Peninsula Campaign during the Napoleonic War, comments were repeatedly made about pants looking more brown due to the repatching using the local brown wool. The logistics wasn't as advanced to just swap out a torn pair of pants. Torn gear just doesn't last long. I also darn my modern socks and have a pair of jeans that is more patch than jeans. Also as a Warrant Officer we can spot a poorly dressed soldier from a parade ground away. :D
Glad I'm not the only one who, when hearing "camp follower," immediately pictured someone following the soldiers around going "Coo-eee, call that a uniform? Has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, doesn't it, darling?"
I hate how people are afraid of hand sewing. It's not that hard, yes it takes a while, and you get better as you practice. It's not this unsurmountable task people seem to think it is these days!
@@dorteweber3682 You can also take it with you in a bag and pull it out while sitting in public transport for half an hour. Or while waiting at the doctor's office.
Handsewing is WAY easier than machine sewing; you don't have to learn how to operate a machine, it's just fine motor skills and I learned _that_ as a child. It takes longer. Time is not the same thing as difficulty.
I don't trust myself with a sewing machine, so I only hand sew when I do any sewing. Actually this video is a great reminder for me to fix a few buttons & hems on some of my modern clothes I've been putting off. Lol
@@LucretiaPearl My sister struggles with the sewing machine because her 3D visualisation is so bad, she even has trouble remembering and visualising which way the fabric travels under the needle. She's the family embroidery master.
Also, you don't need skills to get started: all you need is needle, thread, and enough desperation to motivate you. I had a pair of jeans separate at the middle seam while on a school trip (a week in Ireland when I was 14), and I luckily had a small traveling sewing kit in my bag. I sewed that thing back together in an hour, and while I hurt my fingers and the seam looked messy, it was sturdy enough that it lasted for months after I mended it.
Cloth was amazingly expensive to buy, labor intensive to make, and entirely too valuable to let get trashed. Of course they repaired and maintained their clothing. They couldn't just pop down the shoppes and get a new shirt. A shirt takes a day to make and no one wants to waste a day/day's pay for sewist making a new one if not utterly necessary. I have some SCA clothes that are over 30 years old and I still use them. There's older stuff I've made that is still being used. Do it right and it will hold up for years.
Absolutely! I have always carefully repaired minor holes in my clothes as soon as they appear, but learning to spin on a drop spindle gave me a whole new appreciation for the sheer amount of work that used to go into clothes (and blankets and sails and ...)
My brothers were all in the armed forces. One of the first thing you are taught is how to mend your clothing. They have sewing kits, with spare buttons etc.
My mum's brothers were all in the army from WW2 onwards. Not only did they know how to mend their kit but a couple of them could also knit their own socks.
My friend enlisted in his 40s and was the one teaching all the youngsters how to iron their shirts, I think he did everyone's shirts before they had to do anything fancy...
One "Stitch in Time" episode was about the coat of a Georgian-era laborer depicted in a painting, working out the base style when it was new and the sequence of repairs and alterations as it got handed down over decades.
Yes! I thought of that episode too! Didn't they determine that the coat was probably 75 years old by the time it was painted, based on the changes in style?
Me and my friends who are old ladies are amazed that "young" people don't know how to do basic stuff, like sewing and growing vegetables and home repairs. If you don't know how to do something, have a go and sometimes it will work and sometimes you will need to consult a book or person or the internet. But don't do electrical or gas repairs, as you may burn down your house.
Well, things have changed a lot. And although I would encourage everybody to learn these things, they are not strictly necessary in today's world anymore (though they could become again in the future). Young people are expected to have other skills, like computer skills for example, so they used their time to learn those. I guess there was a time in human history, where older people were astonished that younger ones were not able to make flint tools anymore.
@@johannageisel5390 I've had all those sets of skills since the mid '80s, including computer skills. It does help to have people who expect you to know the basics and are willing to teach you them.
I made sure that my kids born between 1986 & 1992 all know cookery, basic DIY, gardening and clothes reoairs. Some are better than others but at least they've had a start.
I'm fairly certain it's because the in-between generation decided their kids didn't need those skills. I'm in my 30s, so I'm no longer a kid, but my parents taught me both computer skills (we were one of the first families in my hometown to have a computer in the 90s), and sewing and darning and gardening... well, the latter only sort of, we had a tiny garden. But you get the picture. My point was, don't blame the kids, it's more likely that somewhere along the way someone was taught those skills and let them atrophy because, for whatever reason, they decided they were useless. I think a lot of the young generation is rediscovering them now, actually. The pandemic definitely brought home how basic and necessary those skills are.
@@johannageisel5390 I too am 60+ and can hand sew, knit, crochet, plant my own veg then bottle it in the winter, put up a shelf etc etc. I also worked in IT as a code developer and database wrangler for 24 years and have been computer "literate" for over 40 years. It's all about keeping your skills current for the world around you. Being able to sew on a button or fix a sprung seam is something everyone should know.
My father who was a Drill Instructor (DI) could fix a 3 corner tear by hand and carried a darning mushroom in his kit to repair his socks. He was also known to pull on buttons to make sure that they were properly sewn on. His go-to trick was to keep a brand-new set of insignia, belt buckle, and medals on hand for inspection. That way if you had a surprise inspection you wouldn't get caught with unpolished items. Failing an inspection could lead to pealing millions of potatoes or scrubbing the bathrooms with a toothbrush. Both of which my father did on a regular basis during basic training. They still sell the various military sewing kits that have various different buttons for all of their uniforms, i.e. a dress uniform button kit or a combat uniform button kit, etc.
Always love a good exasperated Jimmy vid! I’ve been repairing my own clothes by hand since I can remember, and I think one of the best trends in recent. Uh. Fashion? Clothing? Wearing stuff? discourse has been the rediscovery of visible mending.
I REALLY appreciate him tying this to fast fashion. It's so tragic for our generation (and our planet) that it's often cheaper to buy new then to take the time & effort to repair. Especially in the west people have lost so much of the knowledge and the resources to do so. Can't afford to have one spouse keep house, less likely to live with or near extended family etc. And outside of the few cities with specialized "fashion" districts, the fabric chains that used to supply people making and repairing their own clothing are basically nothing but quilting and cosplay supplies. 😢
I have always repaired mine & my families clothing, couldn't afford to do anything else! We need to teach children how to repair clothing it's such a valuable skill
Can I add a comment about my grandmother's attitude to holey jumpers - knit garments would be totally unravelled, the thin parts of the yarn snipped out and reknit, maybe for a smaller family member, maybe from sweater to slipover, long sleeved to short etc. As late as ww2, mending wool (not rationed) was used to make original garments when balls of fresh yarn were in short supply or needed ration coupons. I also somewhere (possibly one of the interweave books) came across a pattern for socks with a replaceable sole planned in the construction, double thickness and tighter gauge for sturdiness, modern knitters tend to use much larger needles and thicker yarn, so often gets reinforced yarn with nylon (silk would work but ££) whereas historical yarns were tighter spun and finer so less movement of fibres within the stitches and less wear on the garment.
That Egyptian darned tunic really is adorable. I am currently Swiss-darning a sweater I've had for twenty years; no holes, it's just wearing thin in places. It's been relegated to work-clothes status, but I see no reason why it could not serve me in that capacity for twenty years more.
My grandmother would buy a dress every 2-3 years as Sunday best (or, more exactly, to go to the restaurant or see her specialist). When the dress started to get a little worn out, it would become the shopping dress that she would wear to do town market. Then the dress would become a housedress and it would finish as a mop. I do have tea towels that were spun and weaved by my great-grandmother as a bedsheet. Only rags were thrown away. And I still do that
Oh yes, it's a thing. As a direct result we invented a number of games...an alarming number of them involved throwing things at each other. Rocks. Medicine balls. Our own patches (after they became velcro- we called it patch darts).
People often comment how well people were dressed in the 'old times' even though they were poor. This is the reason why. Clothes were expensive but quality and would be mended and remade to try to be a little fashionable.
And generally taken care of. People nowadays think even ironing is too much bother. Well if you don't iron your clothes, they tend to develop permanent folds which are likely to be the first place where the fibres in your clothes start wearing out...
Definitely right. As someone that got taught to sew by my Nanna and Mum so we didn't look poor; it always gets right up my nose when people say poor people would have been in rags. Bugger that.
Right? We might have *been* poor, but there's no need to *look* even worse off than we were. (Besides, how is one to better the family's chances whilst looking the ragamuffin?)
@@moniqueleigh yep, would be letting the side down. You still get stereotyped if you look a scruff, and it's been shown you get better treatment by Drs if you look good in well turned out. This is the halo effect.
Those who could darn 'invisibly' were much admired as your item would look as new. Those who could repair as decoratively like that blue tunic were also much admired.
About 30 years ago, I paid good money for "invisible reweaving" on my favorite wool crepe suit. I worked in the graphics department, and this was when we still had to assemble mockups with an X-Acto knife. Well, I was wearing my best suit for some clients that day and dropped the knife in my lap point down. I didn't stab myself, but I got a hole in the skirt. The "invisible reweaving" expert cut a small patch out of the inside of the waistband, patched that with lining fabric, and somehow wove the threads of the patch into the skirt so you couldn't see anything from the front of the fabric. Amazing!
I firmly believe that everyone should know how to do basic mends to their clothes. There was a guy I knew who almost threw away a jacket because the pocket had a big hole. I stitched it up, gave him a small lecture, and made him buy a sewing kit from pound land with the promise that he'd learn. Not sure if he ever did. But I sure felt better.
I volunteered at my kids' school to repair school uniforms in the used uniform closet. Several parents had tried to patch things together to make it last the rest of the year before donating it. Sewing up hems with giant stitches in mis-matched thread. Sometimes with STAPLES. It was horrifying, but fixable.
I once participated in an American 1800s hand-cart and wagon trek across the plains of Colorado with about 150 people. And I was the only one who had the presence of mind to bring a sewing kit. So every evening of the trek I'd sit in front of the fire with a semicircle of cohorts around me passing the patching and mending. Still one of my fondest memories.
I can't decide to ask if this was a mormon trek or be appalled at the possibility of this being a mormon trek where no-one else thought to bring a sewing kit XD
@@zoinomiko LMAO!!!! That's fantastic! It was a Mormon Trek!!! And it was the trek where no one (but me) including leaders thought to bring a sewing kit!! Freaking hysterical that you guessed it. Be appalled. By all means. It's like Mormons getting together to change a lightbulb where 100 people come and bring refreshments, but nobody thought about plates. *I'm an expatriate. I grew up Mormon, but then I moved and changed my citizenship.
I will say this: learning to make your own clothes (sewing, knitting, nålbindning, take your pick) will give you HELLA motivation to keep them in good condition, and fix them up when they get threadbare. Even just a pair of handknitted socks, you want to keep them because you know exactly how much effort it took to make them. I also wonder how much of the "I don't want to fix my kit" attitude is rooted in the idea that sewing and other textile crafts are women's work, and has therefore been devalued so much over generations.
Loved the museum artifacts of patched garments! (My partner's big into visible mending, so he loved the Egyptian tunic). We're both working towards slow fashion for our wardrobes. I will say that modern stretch blends make it difficult to make good, lasting repairs (RIP my skinny jeans). The "soldiers lacked skills" piece of crap reminds me of an exhibit the Mystic Seaport Museum has on right now called "Sailor Made" and it's all sailors' crafts- including exquisite sewing and embroidery work! (I'm also reminded of the lads on the cast of 'the Terror' being issued handsewing kits and learning basic handwork as part of their 'Discovery Service 1844 Boot Camp'.)
I patched the worn through thigh parts of my work jeans with large patches from my previous work jeans. Those were worn through in the crotch and I had already attempted to mend them, but they were unsalvagable. Both were from a slightly stretchy denim.
10:50 As a former military, the line in this rant, "Did nobody in your Unit tell you ..." made me clench!! This (hypothetical) ragged individual just got his/her entire Unit, or even Regiment, into trouble!! Now we ALL have to go to the Sargent's Sewing Class thanks to Johnson!
Mmmm, Darjeeling and darning, some of my favorite things. I love how you're all like, take care of your kit and you're a better reenactor, which is a message for everyday - "just take care of your clothes" - I don't want to say it makes a person "a better person" because we all have our stories, but it really does make a difference. It's one of those things that we should "bring back" and "normalize" again
I know how to knit socks, fix buttons and burst seems but the Kitchener stitch and darning confuse me. I need to learn it in person because my brain doesn't go 2d to 3d.
@@rebeccaholcombe9043 I saw a video once that explained it pretty well, and it's how I remember it now, with my own further explanation to remember. You always go through two stitches on one needle before you go to the other needle. Front needle is facing you "right side" so it's "knit side", back needle is facing you "wrong side" so it's "purl side". (If your knit is stockinette.) As you go through the two stitches per needle, the first one is taken off the needle and so you insert your sewing needle in the manner you would knit the stitch (knit or purl, see above about the needles), the second one is left on the needle and you insert your sewing needle the opposite direction. There's just a slight variation at the beginning, when you only do one stitch and leave it on, and the end, where you only do one stitch and take it off. You always insert your sewing needle based on which needle you're working on and what you're doing with the stitch. 🙂
I am an ancient roman reenactor. I usually show the job, the tecnique and the life of a first century blacksmith. I remember when I went to a friend who is part of a Celtic group, during a reenactment. I traded with her the dyeing of my favorite tunic with dyer's madder (it turned out a beauuutiful red) for forging 10 functioning sets of iron needles. I got a wonderful red tunic, she got needles and the guests saw how a barter worked and the work of two different artisans. Everyone was happy. She and her friends still uses those needles to sewing and repair clothes of their groups :D And yes... that tunic is my preciousssssss.... so, everytime I see even just a hole, I grab a needle and I repair it
Preaching to the choir! I have repaired my hakama and my underwears so much. I've repaired the seams of my kimono time and time again. I do find a lot of pride in repairing my clothing. The fast fashion clothing of today just melt off of you after a year. Why should I pay so much money to have my clothes be in tatters after a year? Nope, slap a patch on that and darn it, darn it! Also, I took T-shirts I don't wear anymore and made a hat. I've never made a hat before and it's not a very nice hat, but I made it and it's lovely. But, let me take a second and say: whaaaa? Who's saying nobody repaired their clothes?? You're extremely sheltered. My mom slapped patches on our jean's knees all the time. Something older? There is a letter from a samurai writing home just talking about everyday things, and one thing he mentions is him needing to repair his wrist guards before his next kendo meet. I could literally imagine him sitting down the night before, running a needle through his guards. Older? There is a famous kimono worn by Uesugi Kenshin made of nothing but cloth swatches. It is really cool, by the way. I want one. Knee pain is yucky! Just got through a thing with my knee. Recovery took a year and I did not have codeine. Nice. Get well soon and stay on your exercises. They're really important.
@@Rhaifha I feel your pain. It's good that people are able to buy just another pair, but at the same time fail to understand the worth of materials. I also find jeans fit differently with every pair. Why throw away a good pair of good fitting jeans just because they have holes in the knees?! Patching it makes less of a headache in the long run... doesn't it? Hugs... maybe someday you can sneakily sneak behind your sister and give your nephews really awesome looking knee patches.
Am I the only one who now NEEDS more videos of Jimmy teaching us to darn things and polish our armor? Absolutely wonderful video as always. Get well soon Jimmy!
I invested in a pair of wool socks, reinforced them in both heels and toes and was so pleased and excited to wear them... then accidentally washed them with my other clothes and now they're tiny and felted 😭
If you are not in reach of a toddler, cut it in handy pieces for your mending kit. Felted pieces are good mending material. Or model it in a tiny purse for any occasion.
The problem with people not caring for their clothes has been turbocharged by today's fast fashion. The fabric is so flimsy that it is unrepairable. I make most of my clothing. I have garments I wear from 30 years ago or more. I may need to alter pieces and sometimes need to repair them, but they are made with decent quality fabric which makes repair simple. Generally I wear my cloths until the fabric wears out and there isn't enough good fabric left to attach the mending to.
100% agree that most fast fashion fabric is absolute unrepairable tat. One of my goals for the next few years is to gradually replace the cotton spandex garbage blends in my wardrobe with clothing made of fibers that don’t disintegrate when exposed to sunlight. Since I live in a place with a LOT of sunlight and work outdoors.
I taught my son and daughter to sew on a button and mend a tear before they went to school. I'm not mean, honestly, they thought it was fun. My son did sew up the tops of several pairs of socks though. 😂
I think it's something every child at that age should be taught, to be honest - if only because it's a great exercise of fine motor skills and that's _exactly_ what children at that age should be taught! Mind you, I think this in the sense of "why don't you?", not in the sense of "it should be mandatory!" 😅
Strong opener! Hahaha the video in general is great but I liked before we even got into it 😂 A modern US Naval Destroyer comes standard with an industrial sewing machine. It is intended for repairing even the upholstery!
I feel the amount we're willing to repair our clothes is a reflection of the value we place on those items. When I knit my own socks at 8hrs per sock, you can be sure I'm going to darn them even if it's a large area that's wearing thin. Whereas I'm much more likely to throw out a sock I bought from a department store.
A friend who knits socks as their portable, ADHD focus fidget, gave me a few pairs of their holey hand knitted socks, knowing I would repair them, because that absolutely can't stand repairing their work - particularly if they can't find the matching yarn, but also couldn't bear to get rid of them, and had kept them through multiple moves. The glee on their face when they saw my, frankly awful, repairs and that I was wearing them.... 🎉
My father in-law taught me how to darn my expensive wooly work socks (he always did the mending in my husband's family) and now I even do my cotton sweat socks now that I've learned how to do it without making lumps. The less I can support fast fashion sweat shops, the happier I am, even if I can't knit well at all and I suspect crocheted socks might be a bit more knobbly than I'd like, I'm gonna keep all my socks wearable as long as I possibly can. I've got work pants that are covered in paint and sealants and patched nine ways from Sunday because I can't find comfortable work pants anymore (that brand has gone extinct) and I hate clothes shopping these days and I hate the disposable society even more. Get a good one then fix it till it can't be fixed before you replace it.
Jimmy, this is the best rant ever. You are spot on with this. I grew up with my mother darning our socks and repairing our clothes and I continue with this custom. Taking care of what one wears says a lot more about a person than what they might believe. Especially in the "real" world - not just in reenactments, etc. Not to mention, that linen and wool are VERY expensive, for most of us. It was also expensive to people of the past, considering they had to literally make their own fabric and, the hours, or even days/weeks they spent doing that is just crazy. The process of turning flax and wool into fabric, manually by hand - not by modern machinery, is extremely labor intensive. It is no small task, so taking care of one's clothes was absolutely necessary. A person was lucky if they had more than one/two tunics. My mother made all of my clothes, until I was about five years old. And the scraps were used to make other things - like quilts, pot holders, teddy bears, or doll clothes. Nothing ever went to waste. Clothing that was no longer wearable, would be torn up and used as rags. When the rags were no longer usable, they were sometimes donated to local fishermen, which would be mixed with tar/pitch to help patch leaks in wooden boats/ships. Yep, it was a real thing, not just myth, or rumor. Well, I think my nerdiness is showing. 😄 For anyone learning how to sew, Bernadette is a fantastic seamstress to learn from. She and Jimmy are part of an enormous international, online sewing circle, that encompasses all types of historical clothing. There are also, many extensions off of that sewing circle, that encompasses every non-sewing/non-fabric item you can think of, such as armor - both leather and metal, spinning and weaving, and even period jewelry making. It's a huge community of wonderful people, so please check it out and have fun creating yourself a kit, or period wardrobe. 🙂 Great video, Jimmy. As a military veteran, I can totally relate to this. Oh, and that jumper you mended, looks wonderfully artistic. It's quite colorful. Best wishes. 🌱
One of my favourite reenacting memories is spending 4hrs sewing my first Chevron's onto my battle dress after being promoted. I had more people come up and talk with me about what I was doing than the guys two meters away in full kit. Glad to hear you are on the mean Jimmy! I am currently one week into the long recovery process for a spine fracture, so all the videos are helping pass the time but the laughter is counter active! 😂
My grandpa had a saying “hurry up and wait” from his time as a driver in East Germany. His old canvas fatigue pants from the 1950s are also threadbare, covered in patches and darning, and still wearable today.
My great grandmother die when my grandad was 4. He was then brought up by his father, a veteran of WWI. Because of his time in the trenches, he had and touched his son (my grandfather) a lot of life skills like washing and sewing. When my grandad did his national service, he could, wash, iron and sew, this meant during his time in the army he earned more form this type of stuff than he was paid.
The idea that clothing is easily replaceable is so very recent, it's amazing how quickly society's collective memory forgets that just a few decades ago the vast majority of people only bought new clothes when they absolutely needed them, not just because. And by "needed them" I mean something less like, "I'm going out on Friday, I need new clothes", and more like, "It's my wedding, I need a dress". Otherwise, people did have "the dress/suit" (as in, one) for funerals, "the dress/suit" for weddings, etc.
The elderly people in my sewing hangout tell me how their moms used to cut the lower back away from shirts in order to replace the cuffs. Or how they would sew strips of fabric to the sleeve ends of pullovers when the children grew out of them.
Even the wedding dress is a relatively new phenomenon. Sure, the idea has been around for a while, but for a lot of people, it wasn't a one-occasion dress; they got a good dress (or good clothes) for their wedding, and then it was their "Sunday best" for the rest of their life, or at least as long as they could fit in it. As far as I know, the whole "one-occasion wedding dress" thing really only became a universal phenomenon after WW2; up till then, a lot of brides made it an investment for the future and did _not_ marry in a white wedding dress. And now I think about it, I seem to recall also some mentions of white wedding dresses being subsequently dyed to serve as "Sunday best".
People often didn’t even have a new dress for their wedding. Or if they did, all the accessories were borrowed. I was working in a collection at Cambridge University about twenty years ago called the labour law collection which is in the law library. There were discussions of poverty and how it was defined . It was common for the lady of the house to not own a coat, she didn’t need one because she wouldn’t leave the house (not regarded as a priority), and this would be a way of saving the family money. The children would take it in turns to go to school because there were not enough pairs of shoes/boots between them for them all to wear shoes at once. So they had to rotate in order to comply with the legal attendance requirements. There were various rules to do with seasonal work that could be taken advantage of and a sympathetic teacher could help too. And failing that you went in bare feet rather than get fined for non attendance.If you look at school photos lots of children don’t have socks either even if they have boots. So if you had an item of clothing you best believe you looked after it.
The lack of footwear and other clothing was true as recently as the 50’s and 60’s. Even in the 70’s cobblers resolving shoes was essential to keep the poorer people in footwear. If you had more than one pair of shoes you were lucky - and even then it was only 2 or 3 and regular trips fo the cobblers for repairs or resoling.
In the military we used to say "first the equipment, then the person". Emphasizing the fact that maintenance of all your equipment, gear and kit is paramount and you need to make sure all is in order before you start on your own self's much needed maintenance 😅
My grandma and mom taught me mending ( my grandma was a farmer from Romania!) and I’m so glad they did! Such a great video thank you Jimmy for giving us the historical perspective of sewing- we can keep our clothes forever if we try❣️✌🏼
"The great predatory sergeant" is a fearsome visual. I love it. With the cost of clothing prior to the modern era, I cannot imagine people not mending. As for sewing, weren't sailors renown for being able to sew? This is such a great subject.
I will never forget when I was at my first Pennsic in the year 2013, and I got dressed for the day, and started up cardiac hill to get to the first thing I had planned for the day. I was half way up the hill when I passed someone that looked to be heading to the showers, who then looked at me in shock and asked what fancy event I was headed to, and why was I so very dressed up? I replied with some confusion “It’s a Tuesday” and continued on my way. I had just grabbed something to wear for the day in the morning. I was in later Italian Renaissance gown with chopan as well as the appropriate late period leather shoes. Appropriate headwear and metal belt. My jewelry was a little over the top for the time period, but that’s because after I have all the bits I should, I add on a few give away items as largess for any times I deal with someone and I want to show my appreciation or my care. Any time I get dressed I make sure my accessories are on point. It makes a so-so outfit pop and look right.
ALL HAIL ÞE GLORIOUS BEER TENT! And always important to take care of your kit! It’s your cloþing, and critical to take care of it like such. It costs money and labor to make, and you should take pride in it. People in the past made þeir clothing þemselves or had þeir immediate family make þem for þem, and they took care of þeir clothes and þeir armor and weapons, as people still do. Raggedy kit isn’t auþentic, it’s lazy. Take care of your stuff people. Its easy enough for anyone to do or learn to do, so take a few hours to learn how to do it if you don’t already know, and if you do, þen take a few hour to sew up your coat and polish up your mail
watched this video while spinning flax into linen imaging the physical assault I would perpetrate on anyone who didn't look after an item of clothing that is so time consuming to make.
Admittedly I've been out of the reenacting game for well over a decade, but that was something which used to bother me a lot. The majority of people I saw were either in brand spanking new immaculate kit which looked so weirdly out of place for a travelling soldier, or in torn up rags which made them look like destitute beggars. Where was the ordinary worn, cared for, patched, darned and lived-in clothing? I never had much interest in the combat, so I would set up on the edge of camp with a sewing kit and tell people to throw their ripped doublets in the basket and I'll darn them up! Honestly, I loved doing it. Sitting under the shade of a tree, surrounded by the smell of woodsmoke and black powder, stitching patches on - that's genuinely a good time for me! Aw, now I miss it...
As recently as the Victorian era common folks were expected to make their own underwear (shirts, shifts, petticoats, etc.) which is why there were so many books on household hand sewing. I have a hard time imagining that that all of a sudden sprung up during the Victorian era. If you were rich and important enough you could have someone do it for you, but most people learned from a very early age how to do it themselves. Nice outer wear could be purchased, or you could buy nicer and finer cloth, but hand sewing everything goes as far back as we can find needles.
Just to say physiotherapy in ww1 was massage therapy and conducted by trained masseuses who also used electrical muscle stimulation techniques. Sewing or mending clothes was the domain of the forerunners of occupational therapy which emerged as a profession from the war time experiences of volunteers and mental health professionals who used occupation as a therapy primarily to treat shell shock but who also worked with physically wounded servicemen to promote independence and rebuild skills used in everyday life.
The arguments I got (and expected here) were that "people in the period would have just repurposed clothes into rags after a tear. We don't have any evidence of patching" Then they found that tunic MADE of patches and we patch everything now
All wars need a Camp Follower wearing glittery clothes, tap shoes and singing show tunes ala Randy Rainbow. 🎉🎈🥳🙂🖖 PS You look like you're feeling a bit better, Jimmy. I hope so. 🙂🖖💕
@@AstheCrowTries We definitely need more drag performances on Renaissance Faires (or Mittelaltermarkt, as they are called in German = "Medieval Market").
Sewing is an underrated skill in the military. When I was in the US Army in 2003 we were stationed in Kuwait and we were required to sew little patches of infrared reflective material on all our uniforms prior to our invasion of Iraq (for friend/foe identification) and where we were we didn't have access to a sew shop so it was each soldier's responsibility. I was one of the few people who actually had any sewing skills so I had set up a little cottage industry making money sewing the patches on other people's uniforms.
from a US Civil War journal (original spelling): "Bill is on one side of me studying Arithmetick Ulmer is on the other mending his clothes Brewington is fixing his knapsack Bill Blair is reding beside the door and Ques is writing a letter or sumthing else"
I try to always darn my wool socks (most of them hand knitted by my father's mother, now passed, 15-20 years ago) in different colours each time to make a visual map of all the years they've survived and been loved. Some of them actually look really lovely now, even the parts that are a bit of a mess.
My Nain was a tailoress/seamstress and from the early 1920s through to the early eighties made and repaired clothes. A teacher of mine when he found out who I was, told me both he and his brothers as children had trousers made by Nain out of old coats. During the plague I started making my own masks and I am sure I heard her chuckle as I tried to get pleating right and keep my seams tidy. As I'm getting closer to retirement "make and mend" is going to be the motto.😁
Lol, my dad (ex army) said he was so glad his mum (professional seamstress) taught him to sew. Yep he used those skills during deployment. No only did they not want to look ragged, ripped clothing is at risk of getting caught on things & giving away your position if you are sneaking through the forest etc.
I spent hours making a linen tunic. Because I don't want and can't afford to do that again any time soon, I put in the occasional twenty minutes patching a hole, darning a thin place, and replacing popped stitches. I deliberately saved the scraps so I'd have something to use for patching.
I'm the same way. I spent too much time and effort making my historical clothes to not mend them when they get damaged. I think reenactors who let their clothes fall apart must be wearing things that they bought rather than made.
The wildest event I witnessed was one of the highland games in Washington state. Actually now that I think of it, any games I've been to. If I had to guess I'd say over 50.
1- the description of the sergeant is spot on 2- I wasn't issued a sewing kit initially, but if desired they were available (I got out of the US Army in 2012) Edit to add: Bernadette Banner is magical!!!
I remember my mom patching my clothes when I was a young boy, 23 now. I actually still remember, or more accurately I remember my mom remembering it lol, my mom getting into trouble at my kindergarten because I had patches. Neither of us know exactly why we got into trouble, my mom figures it was because they were wondering if we were too poor to afford new clothes (which would be accurate) or something but really no clue. Honestly can not for the life of me understand why anybody would not care for their mail. Like seriously that stuff is expensive as hell, who'd let it just rust all year? Eugh Definitely going to check out Bernadette's book, didn't know that was a thing until just now.
I still mend and let down/take in my kids' clothing, especially school uniforms. If anyone at school were to give me any grief about it, they would be not very politely invited to contribute to the cost of new items.
@@rachelboersma-plug9482 We didn't have uniforms, but a couple of my younger cousins did. I still remember the family pitching in to buy uniforms that were at least 2-3 sizes too big for the oldest and then those with the best sewing skills hemmed/took in the various bits so they'd fit that year. Every time she had a growth spurt, there'd be a "letting out" party of making the stuff fit until there was nothing left to let out. And then they'd buy her a new set to start over & take her old kit back "in" for her younger sister (or friends of the family at the same school). I've also helped with the "taking in/letting out" for kids of friends who have uniforms.
One of the things I value that I inherited from my grandmother is her sewing box. When it came to me it was full of things for mending: thread, needles, elastic, poppers, hooks-and-eyes, bias tape etc. :)
My biggest problem nowadays is how cheaply made all clothing is, even the most expensive pieces. I try caring for them as best as I can, washing everything on delicate, hanging to dry, repairing everything, etc, but they still start looking ratty after a year or two. And don't get me started on the shoes T-T
A stitch in time saves nine!! I was reminded of Japanese boro stitching. I read a textile book once that claimed that once a piece was worn out it was thrown away. I almost threw the book away!! It would have been shared around with every family member of a suitable size, and then cut up to make kids clothes. And as it got thinner and softer it would have been made into baby clothes, nappies, and scraps used as rags. A few years ago I went to a Trench Art Quilt exhibit. In a side room was a "Wagga" quilt, opened out to show worn out baby clothes sewn in as wadding. Modern 'make-do- and-mend has nothing on the past!
17:39 I definitely relate to this bit; just a few weeks back, I went from "I'll *try* and buy secondhand, if I can" to "the only things I'll buy new for my kids and I are undergarments."
Oh I got a little hole in my dress, what should I do? Go out in the field, sow some flax, wait for it to grow, harvest, soak, heckle, spin, weave and sew a new one - or should I just mend the hole?
I just started repairing my own clothing because I suffer from the curse of Thick Thighs rubbing the inside of my favorite jeans down to nothing. But the euphoria of having clothes that fit you and are comfortable and then being able to sew a braid to reinforce a hem, or darning a patch of fabric that's getting too thin is just too amazing for words. I recently found out how to fix a hole in the top of my second-favorite pair of shoes, and it feels amazing to look down and see stitching done in my own hand!
People tend forget quickly. I seen corset with 3 fabrics, I seen stunning silk dresses with 20 patches. I remember how my gran and mum patch my dresses, my gran was the best, she made flowers as patches. My gran also wore her wedding dress as her going out dress, it had been dyed blue and hem shorten and she was buried in it. Yes, when it comes to look poor, people thinks it being tattered clothes ( seen rich kids pretend to be poor) , while poor try their best to keep their clothes perfect and patch.
So good to hear someone talking common sense about people in the past. In my history sessions in schools my usual answer to things like 'they all wore tatty clothes' is 'and why would they do that? '
My mom will be 87 soon. It's humorous to have one of the Grands or Greats (male or female) walk into her house with jeans purchased with huge holes in them. 🤭 ..."In MY day it was disgraceful to go out in public with holes in your clothes! We would have NEVER thought of such!! And we were poor! What do you mean you bought them like that? Lord have mercy!" ...and I agree with her. LOL
One of my favorite Am Rev/ ACW pieces of kit I take with me is my "housewife" as made by tradition, sewed by my Mom. She's no longer with us, so it's a highly important piece of kit for me
Guess why there aren’t many clothes left over from centuries ago? They were remade, then made into other clothes. From there they were handed down to poorer family or servants or made into children’s clothes. From there sold or remade into other items. Fabric that was handmade was cherished and valued. The army valued their laundresses, as fleas in uniforms were terrible. I remember an anecdote about them pressing the fleas dead in seams of woollen kilts. A valued service. Some soldiers even knitted their own socks, my great uncles did.
I remember my grandmother teaching me to sew up runs in nylons in the 80s, because in the 30s and 40s stockings were valuable and you kept them as long and as well as you could.
A while ago, I found a (Polish) contraption for mending stockings in a charity shop. A sort of tiny hook that extends out of a handle and back in to make catching the stitches easier, allegedly. (And then soon after I had to stop wearing them altogether because I have atopic ecsema and my skin decided it can't stand nylons anymore...) So yeah, mending them was so widespread that a commercial tool for it was made!
Especially northern Europeans (vikings) were very handy with the sewing needle. It was a universal skill among men and women. Everybody took care of their stuff, because h&m didn't exist and cloth was a lot more expensive than twine. I started sewing my own stuff for medieval reenactment / living history. Mostly, because the stuff I make fits and is not made of cotton.
THANK YOU for making this video! I spin and weave and sew, and it's very time consuming. For most of history, most people only had one or two outfits because cloth was very time consuming to make by hand, and thus very expensive. OF COURSE you would repair rather than replace. Also, if you are out on campaign and can't get out of the weather, having sturdy clothes in good repair can be a matter of life or death; look at all the soldiers who died of tranch foot in WWI just for want of dry socks. Speaking of socks, it takes me about thiry hours to knit a pair of socks and DAMNED STRAIGHT I darn them when they get holes. By the way, you look great, and you seemed pretty cheerful in this video. I hope that means your brain is doing better.
Yes! Same goes for the 18th century, and into the 19th too, things are patched and pieced and fabric is re-used all the time! There are quite a few extant waistcoats that started off as longer, earlier styles, and were later cut down and updated to later fashions (some with embroidery that makes the alteration Very obvious). There's a purse made from parts of a waistcoat, multiple early Victorian dressing gowns made from 18th century dress silk, breeches made from a quilted petticoat, and at least 3 examples of late 18th century court waistcoats/suits being recut to be late 19th century women's wear. Plus loads of dresses that were remade from much older ones. 18th century dresses were often altered multiple times to update the silhouette & trim, because fabric was EXPENSIVE and goddammit you were going to get as much use out of it as possible!
When her husband volunteered at the beginning of the American Civil War, my 3rd great grandmother (with a 1 year old!) went along in the wagon train as a laundress for the Colonel and other regimental officers. After the battle of Perryville, KY, she was over it and her husband walked back to PA with her and the baby, technically AWOL, but the Colonel liked her so much the story goes that he was understanding when her husband returned and he faced no repercussions.
My grandfather used to tell a (true) story, I loved to listen to him and remember this so many times...
A young man was in the University of Coimbra, one day he received a package from his mother, it has a letter with it "My son, I'm sending you a new shirt made from your father's old shirt. When it gets old send it back so I can make a new shirt for your brother. Love, your mother"
Many years ago, I was at a festival who had gotten a Scottish weaver for demonstrations - the weaver told us that in the real old days, if the house caught on fire, people would rescue the clothing and cloth, because it was quicker and cheaper to build a small wood house then replace the cloth.
Nowadays it’s the TV that gets saved first 🤦🏻♂️
I can well believe it.
Woolens and linens were very expensive before the invention of the power loom. I'd easily bore you explaining all the steps involved in making cloth from the plant or fleece. You can tell this based on dowries, wills and other documents.
Now I dont have a cat anymore I would probably do the same, though its a tossup between all my antique sheets and my great grandmothers sewing machine
@@cuttwice3905 I have a mad project to grow and process my own linen. I've barely started, and already I am VERY VERY CAREFUL with scraps of all sorts of fabric, because of how much effort (human or mechanical) is needed to make it!
Boredom is the curse of the trenches. Mending would actually be helpful for the inside of one's head as much as the outside of one's uniform. (I love Bernadette Banner's book! The way the paper feels is a positive delight.)
the paper is that good ? Ive wanted her book and now I'm more tempted !
Even my mother approved of it.
@A H oh the paper is wonderful. The pictures are a delight, and she makes sewing a joy to learn. If you buy only one sewing book, let it be this book!
As a Sgt, yes, we can spot uniforms out of order from quite a distance.
There are rumors that life on exoplanets will not be found by the JWST, but by a random seargant noticing a missing button on the 5th sleeve of a soldier on Tau Ceti e.
@@johannageisel5390 😂😂😂
And hair. Don't forget hair.
It depends on the SGT. I personally didn’t give a hoot if your hair/clothes weren’t 1000% within reg so long as you’re weren’t being blatant about it. I would kindly and discreetly point out anything that turned someone into bait for the people who had a real liking of being assholes when giving the chance though. Your backpack has a logo in a color that doesn’t fit reg, I couldn’t give less of a crap, hair a bit long but still well kept and professional not my concern we aren’t wearing gas masks any time soon. Wearing a comic book belt because you don’t anticipate anyone noticing, yeah you need to fix that one high speed.
As a 'sarge'. Holy mundane crap this video gave me all the giggles.
The first thing my US Marine brother did when he came home from boot camp was iron his clothes. Even Viggo Mortisen an actor playing a literary fantasy character knew to make Aragon real he had to run around in his costume, rip it, and then repaired it by his own hand. Details like that make something real. Love your channel!!!!!!!!!
Just got Promoted to 1st Sergeant, and I can confirm the spotting holes in a uniform at 350 yards.
I reckon the phrase "they wouldn't have had the skills" might frequently translate to "I don't have the skill"
The whole bit about sergeants was absolutely hilarious to me, mostly because my great-grandad was Director of Artillery for Ireland and, despite only having one eye, was terrifyingly good at spotting stray specks of dust, let alone holes in uniform.
As a weaver, the idea someone would either spend the hours and hours to weave and construct something-or have to have the money to pay someone else to do it-and then just... not take care of it... is so crazy lol.
Ikr, I knit a pair of socks for a man who's 6'4" once. The idea that someone would just walk away from that kind of time investment is ludicrous. I didn't even spin my own yarn!
Ex British Soldier here, ten years service between 2007-2017. Sewing kits were never issued. We had to buy one from one of the shops on camp or make up our own kits. Never got any training in how to sew either. I think I was the only man in my section in basic training that purchased the sewing kit in a DPM pouch. Most squaddies will just take damaged items to the stores and ask for an exchange.
Fine sweaters used to come with a little card of the yarn so you could mend them!
I've bought sweaters in the past 5 or so years that did, maybe from Land's End. Also spare buttons for cardigans.
YES! I've seen so many (mostly guy) reenactors wearing torn, dirty, shredded clothes - and shoes! Yet my mom used to work at a living history museum, and she was one of the people folks who needed a quick patch or repair would seek out if they weren't confident to do it themselves. Like she'd send someone into a basement or upstairs that visitors didn't go into, he'd throw her his torn pants, and she'd fix them up lickety-split. She kept an extensive sewing kit - in housewife form! and including materials for patching sourced from the costuming dept - with her on station. There's no excuse for walking around in torn clothes unless you literally just tore them! It's ahistorical and sloppy!
Yes!!! So much this!
I have a dress that I like to call "the never ending project".
It started out as a 13th century pullover dress in 2009 or '10. After my pregnancy I opened it up in the front and put a lace in (for nursing), so now it is a 14th century dress. About a year later I ripped through my elbows, so I made it a short sleeved kirtle. After picking up and carrying around a growing toddler for three years or so, my arms, shoulders, back and bust didn't fit right anymore. I had kept all scraps of which I made new sleeves, but by that time the dress was about 9 years old and the color had faded.
So I ripped it apart and turned it inside out, in order for the new sleeves to match the old dress!
I've worn it another 3 years and then the backpanel gave out. It had seen a lot of repairs already, especially at the side seams with the strain of lacing it up, but now had simply been worn to thin to hold even one more stitch. I took my last bit of this wool I had left and put on a great big patch over the back, also covering the side seams, secured it well and then cut away the old worn bit on the inside of what now was a whole new back panel.
I'm sure my dress is going to serve me well for another 5 years and more. Only then, I'll have to do my repairs in a different color fabric. Which I'm sure will only add to it's charm!
I have a book about the clothing of the Black Prince based on documents. One of the things was that one of the yearly payments for work done was a "suit of clothes " . Once a year you got clothing! Clothing also was handed down in wills, as well as sheets, blankets and tapestries. Fabric was EXPENSIVE! That was why making it was one of the first things industrialized.
Tapestries ordered and hung by Henry VIII cost as much as a battle ship.
A good linen shirt took an acre of land and a year to make. A viking ship sail took many women and sheep at least 2 years of work, in fact it took longer to spin and weave a sail then to build a boat.
What's the book called? I'd love to read it.
@@lenabreijer1311 thanks!
That’s not really a fair comparison. A crew of men could build a longboat in a few days.
@@kokofan50 it would probably take more then a few days lol when you have to create the planks without power tools. And you have create the nails and roves to stick them together.
@@lenabreijer1311 making the boards is the easiest part. You split the boards then hue them. Also, longboats only used a few nails at the stem and stern. The long part is carving the keel, but with a few dozen guys on a longboat crew, that much wouldn’t take long.
It's so good to see this post! I'm in a group in Australia called The Revolting Peasants and I make the special effort to patch and darn my gear. Partially because I'm cheap but mainly because repaired clothing looks great. Coincidentally, I'm currently patching one of my very old tunics again.
Even in the Peninsula Campaign during the Napoleonic War, comments were repeatedly made about pants looking more brown due to the repatching using the local brown wool. The logistics wasn't as advanced to just swap out a torn pair of pants. Torn gear just doesn't last long.
I also darn my modern socks and have a pair of jeans that is more patch than jeans.
Also as a Warrant Officer we can spot a poorly dressed soldier from a parade ground away.
:D
Glad I'm not the only one who, when hearing "camp follower," immediately pictured someone following the soldiers around going "Coo-eee, call that a uniform? Has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, doesn't it, darling?"
I hate how people are afraid of hand sewing. It's not that hard, yes it takes a while, and you get better as you practice. It's not this unsurmountable task people seem to think it is these days!
@@dorteweber3682 You can also take it with you in a bag and pull it out while sitting in public transport for half an hour. Or while waiting at the doctor's office.
Handsewing is WAY easier than machine sewing; you don't have to learn how to operate a machine, it's just fine motor skills and I learned _that_ as a child. It takes longer. Time is not the same thing as difficulty.
I don't trust myself with a sewing machine, so I only hand sew when I do any sewing. Actually this video is a great reminder for me to fix a few buttons & hems on some of my modern clothes I've been putting off. Lol
@@LucretiaPearl My sister struggles with the sewing machine because her 3D visualisation is so bad, she even has trouble remembering and visualising which way the fabric travels under the needle.
She's the family embroidery master.
Also, you don't need skills to get started: all you need is needle, thread, and enough desperation to motivate you. I had a pair of jeans separate at the middle seam while on a school trip (a week in Ireland when I was 14), and I luckily had a small traveling sewing kit in my bag. I sewed that thing back together in an hour, and while I hurt my fingers and the seam looked messy, it was sturdy enough that it lasted for months after I mended it.
Cloth was amazingly expensive to buy, labor intensive to make, and entirely too valuable to let get trashed. Of course they repaired and maintained their clothing. They couldn't just pop down the shoppes and get a new shirt. A shirt takes a day to make and no one wants to waste a day/day's pay for sewist making a new one if not utterly necessary. I have some SCA clothes that are over 30 years old and I still use them. There's older stuff I've made that is still being used. Do it right and it will hold up for years.
Absolutely! I have always carefully repaired minor holes in my clothes as soon as they appear, but learning to spin on a drop spindle gave me a whole new appreciation for the sheer amount of work that used to go into clothes (and blankets and sails and ...)
I would love if Bernadette narrated her own audiobook.
I do love Jimmy Attenborough narrating the Wild Sergeant creature documentary 😂
My brothers were all in the armed forces. One of the first thing you are taught is how to mend your clothing. They have sewing kits, with spare buttons etc.
My mum's brothers were all in the army from WW2 onwards. Not only did they know how to mend their kit but a couple of them could also knit their own socks.
My friend enlisted in his 40s and was the one teaching all the youngsters how to iron their shirts, I think he did everyone's shirts before they had to do anything fancy...
One "Stitch in Time" episode was about the coat of a Georgian-era laborer depicted in a painting, working out the base style when it was new and the sequence of repairs and alterations as it got handed down over decades.
Yes! I thought of that episode too! Didn't they determine that the coat was probably 75 years old by the time it was painted, based on the changes in style?
Me and my friends who are old ladies are amazed that "young" people don't know how to do basic stuff, like sewing and growing vegetables and home repairs. If you don't know how to do something, have a go and sometimes it will work and sometimes you will need to consult a book or person or the internet. But don't do electrical or gas repairs, as you may burn down your house.
Well, things have changed a lot. And although I would encourage everybody to learn these things, they are not strictly necessary in today's world anymore (though they could become again in the future).
Young people are expected to have other skills, like computer skills for example, so they used their time to learn those.
I guess there was a time in human history, where older people were astonished that younger ones were not able to make flint tools anymore.
@@johannageisel5390 I've had all those sets of skills since the mid '80s, including computer skills. It does help to have people who expect you to know the basics and are willing to teach you them.
I made sure that my kids born between 1986 & 1992 all know cookery, basic DIY, gardening and clothes reoairs. Some are better than others but at least they've had a start.
I'm fairly certain it's because the in-between generation decided their kids didn't need those skills.
I'm in my 30s, so I'm no longer a kid, but my parents taught me both computer skills (we were one of the first families in my hometown to have a computer in the 90s), and sewing and darning and gardening... well, the latter only sort of, we had a tiny garden. But you get the picture. My point was, don't blame the kids, it's more likely that somewhere along the way someone was taught those skills and let them atrophy because, for whatever reason, they decided they were useless.
I think a lot of the young generation is rediscovering them now, actually. The pandemic definitely brought home how basic and necessary those skills are.
@@johannageisel5390 I too am 60+ and can hand sew, knit, crochet, plant my own veg then bottle it in the winter, put up a shelf etc etc. I also worked in IT as a code developer and database wrangler for 24 years and have been computer "literate" for over 40 years. It's all about keeping your skills current for the world around you. Being able to sew on a button or fix a sprung seam is something everyone should know.
My father who was a Drill Instructor (DI) could fix a 3 corner tear by hand and carried a darning mushroom in his kit to repair his socks. He was also known to pull on buttons to make sure that they were properly sewn on. His go-to trick was to keep a brand-new set of insignia, belt buckle, and medals on hand for inspection. That way if you had a surprise inspection you wouldn't get caught with unpolished items. Failing an inspection could lead to pealing millions of potatoes or scrubbing the bathrooms with a toothbrush. Both of which my father did on a regular basis during basic training. They still sell the various military sewing kits that have various different buttons for all of their uniforms, i.e. a dress uniform button kit or a combat uniform button kit, etc.
Always love a good exasperated Jimmy vid! I’ve been repairing my own clothes by hand since I can remember, and I think one of the best trends in recent. Uh. Fashion? Clothing? Wearing stuff? discourse has been the rediscovery of visible mending.
I REALLY appreciate him tying this to fast fashion. It's so tragic for our generation (and our planet) that it's often cheaper to buy new then to take the time & effort to repair. Especially in the west people have lost so much of the knowledge and the resources to do so. Can't afford to have one spouse keep house, less likely to live with or near extended family etc. And outside of the few cities with specialized "fashion" districts, the fabric chains that used to supply people making and repairing their own clothing are basically nothing but quilting and cosplay supplies. 😢
I have always repaired mine & my families clothing, couldn't afford to do anything else! We need to teach children how to repair clothing it's such a valuable skill
Can I add a comment about my grandmother's attitude to holey jumpers - knit garments would be totally unravelled, the thin parts of the yarn snipped out and reknit, maybe for a smaller family member, maybe from sweater to slipover, long sleeved to short etc.
As late as ww2, mending wool (not rationed) was used to make original garments when balls of fresh yarn were in short supply or needed ration coupons.
I also somewhere (possibly one of the interweave books) came across a pattern for socks with a replaceable sole planned in the construction, double thickness and tighter gauge for sturdiness, modern knitters tend to use much larger needles and thicker yarn, so often gets reinforced yarn with nylon (silk would work but ££) whereas historical yarns were tighter spun and finer so less movement of fibres within the stitches and less wear on the garment.
Elizabeth Zimmermann has a pattern in one of her classic books (Pretty sure it's the Almanac) for socks with replaceable soles.
That Egyptian darned tunic really is adorable.
I am currently Swiss-darning a sweater I've had for twenty years; no holes, it's just wearing thin in places. It's been relegated to work-clothes status, but I see no reason why it could not serve me in that capacity for twenty years more.
My grandmother would buy a dress every 2-3 years as Sunday best (or, more exactly, to go to the restaurant or see her specialist). When the dress started to get a little worn out, it would become the shopping dress that she would wear to do town market. Then the dress would become a housedress and it would finish as a mop. I do have tea towels that were spun and weaved by my great-grandmother as a bedsheet. Only rags were thrown away. And I still do that
"Hurry up and wait" is something I frequently hear from veterans
Oh yes, it's a thing. As a direct result we invented a number of games...an alarming number of them involved throwing things at each other. Rocks. Medicine balls. Our own patches (after they became velcro- we called it patch darts).
People often comment how well people were dressed in the 'old times' even though they were poor. This is the reason why. Clothes were expensive but quality and would be mended and remade to try to be a little fashionable.
And generally taken care of. People nowadays think even ironing is too much bother. Well if you don't iron your clothes, they tend to develop permanent folds which are likely to be the first place where the fibres in your clothes start wearing out...
Definitely right. As someone that got taught to sew by my Nanna and Mum so we didn't look poor; it always gets right up my nose when people say poor people would have been in rags. Bugger that.
Right? We might have *been* poor, but there's no need to *look* even worse off than we were. (Besides, how is one to better the family's chances whilst looking the ragamuffin?)
@@moniqueleigh yep, would be letting the side down. You still get stereotyped if you look a scruff, and it's been shown you get better treatment by Drs if you look good in well turned out. This is the halo effect.
Those who could darn 'invisibly' were much admired as your item would look as new. Those who could repair as decoratively like that blue tunic were also much admired.
About 30 years ago, I paid good money for "invisible reweaving" on my favorite wool crepe suit. I worked in the graphics department, and this was when we still had to assemble mockups with an X-Acto knife. Well, I was wearing my best suit for some clients that day and dropped the knife in my lap point down. I didn't stab myself, but I got a hole in the skirt.
The "invisible reweaving" expert cut a small patch out of the inside of the waistband, patched that with lining fabric, and somehow wove the threads of the patch into the skirt so you couldn't see anything from the front of the fabric. Amazing!
I firmly believe that everyone should know how to do basic mends to their clothes. There was a guy I knew who almost threw away a jacket because the pocket had a big hole. I stitched it up, gave him a small lecture, and made him buy a sewing kit from pound land with the promise that he'd learn.
Not sure if he ever did. But I sure felt better.
I volunteered at my kids' school to repair school uniforms in the used uniform closet. Several parents had tried to patch things together to make it last the rest of the year before donating it. Sewing up hems with giant stitches in mis-matched thread. Sometimes with STAPLES. It was horrifying, but fixable.
Another patched item of clothing is the leather frock coat that the hedge worker is wearing that they remade in “stitch in time” episode.
I once participated in an American 1800s hand-cart and wagon trek across the plains of Colorado with about 150 people. And I was the only one who had the presence of mind to bring a sewing kit. So every evening of the trek I'd sit in front of the fire with a semicircle of cohorts around me passing the patching and mending. Still one of my fondest memories.
I can't decide to ask if this was a mormon trek or be appalled at the possibility of this being a mormon trek where no-one else thought to bring a sewing kit XD
@@zoinomiko LMAO!!!! That's fantastic! It was a Mormon Trek!!! And it was the trek where no one (but me) including leaders thought to bring a sewing kit!! Freaking hysterical that you guessed it. Be appalled. By all means. It's like Mormons getting together to change a lightbulb where 100 people come and bring refreshments, but nobody thought about plates.
*I'm an expatriate. I grew up Mormon, but then I moved and changed my citizenship.
I will say this: learning to make your own clothes (sewing, knitting, nålbindning, take your pick) will give you HELLA motivation to keep them in good condition, and fix them up when they get threadbare. Even just a pair of handknitted socks, you want to keep them because you know exactly how much effort it took to make them.
I also wonder how much of the "I don't want to fix my kit" attitude is rooted in the idea that sewing and other textile crafts are women's work, and has therefore been devalued so much over generations.
Loved the museum artifacts of patched garments! (My partner's big into visible mending, so he loved the Egyptian tunic). We're both working towards slow fashion for our wardrobes. I will say that modern stretch blends make it difficult to make good, lasting repairs (RIP my skinny jeans).
The "soldiers lacked skills" piece of crap reminds me of an exhibit the Mystic Seaport Museum has on right now called "Sailor Made" and it's all sailors' crafts- including exquisite sewing and embroidery work! (I'm also reminded of the lads on the cast of 'the Terror' being issued handsewing kits and learning basic handwork as part of their 'Discovery Service 1844 Boot Camp'.)
I patched the worn through thigh parts of my work jeans with large patches from my previous work jeans. Those were worn through in the crotch and I had already attempted to mend them, but they were unsalvagable.
Both were from a slightly stretchy denim.
10:50 As a former military, the line in this rant, "Did nobody in your Unit tell you ..." made me clench!! This (hypothetical) ragged individual just got his/her entire Unit, or even Regiment, into trouble!! Now we ALL have to go to the Sargent's Sewing Class thanks to Johnson!
Should have told Chalky his epaulette was hanging off! DonMt blame me!
Mmmm, Darjeeling and darning, some of my favorite things. I love how you're all like, take care of your kit and you're a better reenactor, which is a message for everyday - "just take care of your clothes" - I don't want to say it makes a person "a better person" because we all have our stories, but it really does make a difference. It's one of those things that we should "bring back" and "normalize" again
I'm watching this while drinking Darjeeling.
I know how to knit socks, fix buttons and burst seems but the Kitchener stitch and darning confuse me. I need to learn it in person because my brain doesn't go 2d to 3d.
@@rebeccaholcombe9043 I saw a video once that explained it pretty well, and it's how I remember it now, with my own further explanation to remember. You always go through two stitches on one needle before you go to the other needle. Front needle is facing you "right side" so it's "knit side", back needle is facing you "wrong side" so it's "purl side". (If your knit is stockinette.) As you go through the two stitches per needle, the first one is taken off the needle and so you insert your sewing needle in the manner you would knit the stitch (knit or purl, see above about the needles), the second one is left on the needle and you insert your sewing needle the opposite direction.
There's just a slight variation at the beginning, when you only do one stitch and leave it on, and the end, where you only do one stitch and take it off. You always insert your sewing needle based on which needle you're working on and what you're doing with the stitch. 🙂
I am an ancient roman reenactor. I usually show the job, the tecnique and the life of a first century blacksmith. I remember when I went to a friend who is part of a Celtic group, during a reenactment. I traded with her the dyeing of my favorite tunic with dyer's madder (it turned out a beauuutiful red) for forging 10 functioning sets of iron needles. I got a wonderful red tunic, she got needles and the guests saw how a barter worked and the work of two different artisans. Everyone was happy.
She and her friends still uses those needles to sewing and repair clothes of their groups :D
And yes... that tunic is my preciousssssss.... so, everytime I see even just a hole, I grab a needle and I repair it
Preaching to the choir! I have repaired my hakama and my underwears so much. I've repaired the seams of my kimono time and time again. I do find a lot of pride in repairing my clothing. The fast fashion clothing of today just melt off of you after a year. Why should I pay so much money to have my clothes be in tatters after a year? Nope, slap a patch on that and darn it, darn it! Also, I took T-shirts I don't wear anymore and made a hat. I've never made a hat before and it's not a very nice hat, but I made it and it's lovely.
But, let me take a second and say: whaaaa? Who's saying nobody repaired their clothes?? You're extremely sheltered. My mom slapped patches on our jean's knees all the time. Something older? There is a letter from a samurai writing home just talking about everyday things, and one thing he mentions is him needing to repair his wrist guards before his next kendo meet. I could literally imagine him sitting down the night before, running a needle through his guards. Older? There is a famous kimono worn by Uesugi Kenshin made of nothing but cloth swatches. It is really cool, by the way. I want one.
Knee pain is yucky! Just got through a thing with my knee. Recovery took a year and I did not have codeine. Nice. Get well soon and stay on your exercises. They're really important.
I've offered to patch knees on my nephews jeans, but my sister literally refuses because "it's easier to buy a new pair".
It makes me sad.
@@Rhaifha I feel your pain. It's good that people are able to buy just another pair, but at the same time fail to understand the worth of materials.
I also find jeans fit differently with every pair. Why throw away a good pair of good fitting jeans just because they have holes in the knees?! Patching it makes less of a headache in the long run... doesn't it?
Hugs... maybe someday you can sneakily sneak behind your sister and give your nephews really awesome looking knee patches.
Am I the only one who now NEEDS more videos of Jimmy teaching us to darn things and polish our armor? Absolutely wonderful video as always. Get well soon Jimmy!
I invested in a pair of wool socks, reinforced them in both heels and toes and was so pleased and excited to wear them... then accidentally washed them with my other clothes and now they're tiny and felted 😭
That is really sad. Guess you have to find a toddler.
If you are not in reach of a toddler, cut it in handy pieces for your mending kit. Felted pieces are good mending material.
Or model it in a tiny purse for any occasion.
I shrunk my pipe band socks and I was devastated! I want to unravel them and knit something new.
Make them into a keychain, nobody need know it wasn’t deliberate and you have a funny pub story with proof.
I do understand. My husband tossed my hand-knit cashmere v-neck in the washer/dryer and made a lovely Barbie sweater. He was helping.
The problem with people not caring for their clothes has been turbocharged by today's fast fashion. The fabric is so flimsy that it is unrepairable.
I make most of my clothing. I have garments I wear from 30 years ago or more. I may need to alter pieces and sometimes need to repair them, but they are made with decent quality fabric which makes repair simple. Generally I wear my cloths until the fabric wears out and there isn't enough good fabric left to attach the mending to.
100% agree that most fast fashion fabric is absolute unrepairable tat. One of my goals for the next few years is to gradually replace the cotton spandex garbage blends in my wardrobe with clothing made of fibers that don’t disintegrate when exposed to sunlight. Since I live in a place with a LOT of sunlight and work outdoors.
I taught my son and daughter to sew on a button and mend a tear before they went to school. I'm not mean, honestly, they thought it was fun. My son did sew up the tops of several pairs of socks though. 😂
I think it's something every child at that age should be taught, to be honest - if only because it's a great exercise of fine motor skills and that's _exactly_ what children at that age should be taught!
Mind you, I think this in the sense of "why don't you?", not in the sense of "it should be mandatory!" 😅
Strong opener! Hahaha the video in general is great but I liked before we even got into it 😂
A modern US Naval Destroyer comes standard with an industrial sewing machine. It is intended for repairing even the upholstery!
I feel the amount we're willing to repair our clothes is a reflection of the value we place on those items. When I knit my own socks at 8hrs per sock, you can be sure I'm going to darn them even if it's a large area that's wearing thin. Whereas I'm much more likely to throw out a sock I bought from a department store.
A friend who knits socks as their portable, ADHD focus fidget, gave me a few pairs of their holey hand knitted socks, knowing I would repair them, because that absolutely can't stand repairing their work - particularly if they can't find the matching yarn, but also couldn't bear to get rid of them, and had kept them through multiple moves.
The glee on their face when they saw my, frankly awful, repairs and that I was wearing them.... 🎉
My father in-law taught me how to darn my expensive wooly work socks (he always did the mending in my husband's family) and now I even do my cotton sweat socks now that I've learned how to do it without making lumps. The less I can support fast fashion sweat shops, the happier I am, even if I can't knit well at all and I suspect crocheted socks might be a bit more knobbly than I'd like, I'm gonna keep all my socks wearable as long as I possibly can. I've got work pants that are covered in paint and sealants and patched nine ways from Sunday because I can't find comfortable work pants anymore (that brand has gone extinct) and I hate clothes shopping these days and I hate the disposable society even more. Get a good one then fix it till it can't be fixed before you replace it.
Jimmy, this is the best rant ever. You are spot on with this. I grew up with my mother darning our socks and repairing our clothes and I continue with this custom. Taking care of what one wears says a lot more about a person than what they might believe. Especially in the "real" world - not just in reenactments, etc. Not to mention, that linen and wool are VERY expensive, for most of us. It was also expensive to people of the past, considering they had to literally make their own fabric and, the hours, or even days/weeks they spent doing that is just crazy. The process of turning flax and wool into fabric, manually by hand - not by modern machinery, is extremely labor intensive. It is no small task, so taking care of one's clothes was absolutely necessary. A person was lucky if they had more than one/two tunics. My mother made all of my clothes, until I was about five years old. And the scraps were used to make other things - like quilts, pot holders, teddy bears, or doll clothes. Nothing ever went to waste. Clothing that was no longer wearable, would be torn up and used as rags. When the rags were no longer usable, they were sometimes donated to local fishermen, which would be mixed with tar/pitch to help patch leaks in wooden boats/ships. Yep, it was a real thing, not just myth, or rumor. Well, I think my nerdiness is showing. 😄
For anyone learning how to sew, Bernadette is a fantastic seamstress to learn from. She and Jimmy are part of an enormous international, online sewing circle, that encompasses all types of historical clothing. There are also, many extensions off of that sewing circle, that encompasses every non-sewing/non-fabric item you can think of, such as armor - both leather and metal, spinning and weaving, and even period jewelry making. It's a huge community of wonderful people, so please check it out and have fun creating yourself a kit, or period wardrobe. 🙂 Great video, Jimmy. As a military veteran, I can totally relate to this. Oh, and that jumper you mended, looks wonderfully artistic. It's quite colorful. Best wishes. 🌱
One of my favourite reenacting memories is spending 4hrs sewing my first Chevron's onto my battle dress after being promoted. I had more people come up and talk with me about what I was doing than the guys two meters away in full kit. Glad to hear you are on the mean Jimmy! I am currently one week into the long recovery process for a spine fracture, so all the videos are helping pass the time but the laughter is counter active! 😂
😂😂😂. Love the definition of the abilities of the sergeant.
My grandpa had a saying “hurry up and wait” from his time as a driver in East Germany. His old canvas fatigue pants from the 1950s are also threadbare, covered in patches and darning, and still wearable today.
alel;fjkapsdjf the double-take I did when you said "Buy Bernadette's Book" like YES we are in the Costube Cinematic Universe
Bernadette deserves ***all*** the shoutouts. XDD I have her book, too! 10/10 for men cooking and sewing like this.
My great grandmother die when my grandad was 4. He was then brought up by his father, a veteran of WWI.
Because of his time in the trenches, he had and touched his son (my grandfather) a lot of life skills like washing and sewing.
When my grandad did his national service, he could, wash, iron and sew, this meant during his time in the army he earned more form this type of stuff than he was paid.
The idea that clothing is easily replaceable is so very recent, it's amazing how quickly society's collective memory forgets that just a few decades ago the vast majority of people only bought new clothes when they absolutely needed them, not just because.
And by "needed them" I mean something less like, "I'm going out on Friday, I need new clothes", and more like, "It's my wedding, I need a dress". Otherwise, people did have "the dress/suit" (as in, one) for funerals, "the dress/suit" for weddings, etc.
The elderly people in my sewing hangout tell me how their moms used to cut the lower back away from shirts in order to replace the cuffs.
Or how they would sew strips of fabric to the sleeve ends of pullovers when the children grew out of them.
Even the wedding dress is a relatively new phenomenon.
Sure, the idea has been around for a while, but for a lot of people, it wasn't a one-occasion dress; they got a good dress (or good clothes) for their wedding, and then it was their "Sunday best" for the rest of their life, or at least as long as they could fit in it. As far as I know, the whole "one-occasion wedding dress" thing really only became a universal phenomenon after WW2; up till then, a lot of brides made it an investment for the future and did _not_ marry in a white wedding dress. And now I think about it, I seem to recall also some mentions of white wedding dresses being subsequently dyed to serve as "Sunday best".
@@beth12svist Yes, exactly. People took care of what they had for as long as they could.
People often didn’t even have a new dress for their wedding. Or if they did, all the accessories were borrowed.
I was working in a collection at Cambridge University about twenty years ago called the labour law collection which is in the law library. There were discussions of poverty and how it was defined . It was common for the lady of the house to not own a coat, she didn’t need one because she wouldn’t leave the house (not regarded as a priority), and this would be a way of saving the family money. The children would take it in turns to go to school because there were not enough pairs of shoes/boots between them for them all to wear shoes at once. So they had to rotate in order to comply with the legal attendance requirements. There were various rules to do with seasonal work that could be taken advantage of and a sympathetic teacher could help too. And failing that you went in bare feet rather than get fined for non attendance.If you look at school photos lots of children don’t have socks either even if they have boots. So if you had an item of clothing you best believe you looked after it.
The lack of footwear and other clothing was true as recently as the 50’s and 60’s. Even in the 70’s cobblers resolving shoes was essential to keep the poorer people in footwear. If you had more than one pair of shoes you were lucky - and even then it was only 2 or 3 and regular trips fo the cobblers for repairs or resoling.
In the military we used to say "first the equipment, then the person". Emphasizing the fact that maintenance of all your equipment, gear and kit is paramount and you need to make sure all is in order before you start on your own self's much needed maintenance 😅
My grandma and mom taught me mending ( my grandma was a farmer from Romania!) and I’m so glad they did! Such a great video thank you Jimmy for giving us the historical perspective of sewing- we can keep our clothes forever if we try❣️✌🏼
I know the Canadian military had standardized sewing kit. 😊
"The great predatory sergeant" is a fearsome visual. I love it. With the cost of clothing prior to the modern era, I cannot imagine people not mending. As for sewing, weren't sailors renown for being able to sew?
This is such a great subject.
I keep hearing the Sergeant in R. Lee Ermey's voice.
I will never forget when I was at my first Pennsic in the year 2013, and I got dressed for the day, and started up cardiac hill to get to the first thing I had planned for the day. I was half way up the hill when I passed someone that looked to be heading to the showers, who then looked at me in shock and asked what fancy event I was headed to, and why was I so very dressed up? I replied with some confusion “It’s a Tuesday” and continued on my way. I had just grabbed something to wear for the day in the morning. I was in later Italian Renaissance gown with chopan as well as the appropriate late period leather shoes. Appropriate headwear and metal belt. My jewelry was a little over the top for the time period, but that’s because after I have all the bits I should, I add on a few give away items as largess for any times I deal with someone and I want to show my appreciation or my care. Any time I get dressed I make sure my accessories are on point. It makes a so-so outfit pop and look right.
ALL HAIL ÞE GLORIOUS BEER TENT! And always important to take care of your kit! It’s your cloþing, and critical to take care of it like such. It costs money and labor to make, and you should take pride in it. People in the past made þeir clothing þemselves or had þeir immediate family make þem for þem, and they took care of þeir clothes and þeir armor and weapons, as people still do. Raggedy kit isn’t auþentic, it’s lazy. Take care of your stuff people. Its easy enough for anyone to do or learn to do, so take a few hours to learn how to do it if you don’t already know, and if you do, þen take a few hour to sew up your coat and polish up your mail
I deeply deeply appreciate your effort to bring the þ back into the written English language. It makes me so happy for some reason! I love it!
@@berkleypearl2363 Þank you! Im trying my best, and I’m glad to see it’s making people happy
watched this video while spinning flax into linen imaging the physical assault I would perpetrate on anyone who didn't look after an item of clothing that is so time consuming to make.
Admittedly I've been out of the reenacting game for well over a decade, but that was something which used to bother me a lot. The majority of people I saw were either in brand spanking new immaculate kit which looked so weirdly out of place for a travelling soldier, or in torn up rags which made them look like destitute beggars. Where was the ordinary worn, cared for, patched, darned and lived-in clothing? I never had much interest in the combat, so I would set up on the edge of camp with a sewing kit and tell people to throw their ripped doublets in the basket and I'll darn them up! Honestly, I loved doing it. Sitting under the shade of a tree, surrounded by the smell of woodsmoke and black powder, stitching patches on - that's genuinely a good time for me! Aw, now I miss it...
As recently as the Victorian era common folks were expected to make their own underwear (shirts, shifts, petticoats, etc.) which is why there were so many books on household hand sewing. I have a hard time imagining that that all of a sudden sprung up during the Victorian era. If you were rich and important enough you could have someone do it for you, but most people learned from a very early age how to do it themselves. Nice outer wear could be purchased, or you could buy nicer and finer cloth, but hand sewing everything goes as far back as we can find needles.
As an ex soldier myself I can confirm that the Sgt was indeed a cruel animal 😂 😂
My father was in the USMC and his gunny literally had the last name “Mortis”. They called him “Rigor Mortis” for a reason.
Thus The Welsh Viking Sewing Society is born! Seriously, I was taught to darn socks when I was in about 2nd grade.
Just to say physiotherapy in ww1 was massage therapy and conducted by trained masseuses who also used electrical muscle stimulation techniques. Sewing or mending clothes was the domain of the forerunners of occupational therapy which emerged as a profession from the war time experiences of volunteers and mental health professionals who used occupation as a therapy primarily to treat shell shock but who also worked with physically wounded servicemen to promote independence and rebuild skills used in everyday life.
The arguments I got (and expected here) were that "people in the period would have just repurposed clothes into rags after a tear. We don't have any evidence of patching" Then they found that tunic MADE of patches and we patch everything now
All wars need a Camp Follower wearing glittery clothes, tap shoes and singing show tunes ala Randy Rainbow. 🎉🎈🥳🙂🖖
PS You look like you're feeling a bit better, Jimmy. I hope so. 🙂🖖💕
I do want Randy Rainbow in my camp lol
I'm a moonlighting drag performer and historical clothing maker, and now I have a new life's goal.
@@AstheCrowTries We definitely need more drag performances on Renaissance Faires (or Mittelaltermarkt, as they are called in German = "Medieval Market").
Sewing is an underrated skill in the military. When I was in the US Army in 2003 we were stationed in Kuwait and we were required to sew little patches of infrared reflective material on all our uniforms prior to our invasion of Iraq (for friend/foe identification) and where we were we didn't have access to a sew shop so it was each soldier's responsibility. I was one of the few people who actually had any sewing skills so I had set up a little cottage industry making money sewing the patches on other people's uniforms.
"hurry up and wait" is definitely the way of war
from a US Civil War journal (original spelling): "Bill is on one side of me studying Arithmetick Ulmer is on the other mending his clothes Brewington is fixing his knapsack Bill Blair is reding beside the door and Ques is writing a letter or sumthing else"
Modern people too often think of clothing in modern terms. This is a nice reminder.
Maybe we can bring the darned sweater in as a fun trend.
I try to always darn my wool socks (most of them hand knitted by my father's mother, now passed, 15-20 years ago) in different colours each time to make a visual map of all the years they've survived and been loved.
Some of them actually look really lovely now, even the parts that are a bit of a mess.
Thanks for the reminder to mend my nalbind socks
My Nain was a tailoress/seamstress and from the early 1920s through to the early eighties made and repaired clothes. A teacher of mine when he found out who I was, told me both he and his brothers as children had trousers made by Nain out of old coats.
During the plague I started making my own masks and I am sure I heard her chuckle as I tried to get pleating right and keep my seams tidy.
As I'm getting closer to retirement "make and mend" is going to be the motto.😁
Lol, my dad (ex army) said he was so glad his mum (professional seamstress) taught him to sew. Yep he used those skills during deployment.
No only did they not want to look ragged, ripped clothing is at risk of getting caught on things & giving away your position if you are sneaking through the forest etc.
I spent hours making a linen tunic. Because I don't want and can't afford to do that again any time soon, I put in the occasional twenty minutes patching a hole, darning a thin place, and replacing popped stitches. I deliberately saved the scraps so I'd have something to use for patching.
I'm the same way. I spent too much time and effort making my historical clothes to not mend them when they get damaged. I think reenactors who let their clothes fall apart must be wearing things that they bought rather than made.
I have Bernadette's book, so useful.
If you think it's bad in the UK, Jimmy, you should see the nightmare that is reenactment in my part of California.
Well how bad could it be? Let’s have a little Googl- oh no. No. NO. Lawrd.
@@TheWelshViking 😂😂😂
What would one google to see reenactment in your part of California?
The wildest event I witnessed was one of the highland games in Washington state. Actually now that I think of it, any games I've been to. If I had to guess I'd say over 50.
@@TheWelshViking yes the highland games "living history" is particularly horrifying
1- the description of the sergeant is spot on
2- I wasn't issued a sewing kit initially, but if desired they were available (I got out of the US Army in 2012)
Edit to add:
Bernadette Banner is magical!!!
I remember my mom patching my clothes when I was a young boy, 23 now. I actually still remember, or more accurately I remember my mom remembering it lol, my mom getting into trouble at my kindergarten because I had patches.
Neither of us know exactly why we got into trouble, my mom figures it was because they were wondering if we were too poor to afford new clothes (which would be accurate) or something but really no clue.
Honestly can not for the life of me understand why anybody would not care for their mail. Like seriously that stuff is expensive as hell, who'd let it just rust all year? Eugh
Definitely going to check out Bernadette's book, didn't know that was a thing until just now.
I still mend and let down/take in my kids' clothing, especially school uniforms. If anyone at school were to give me any grief about it, they would be not very politely invited to contribute to the cost of new items.
@@rachelboersma-plug9482 Pretty much exactly my mom's reaction too lol. She still gets pissed about it when she recounts it
@@rachelboersma-plug9482 We didn't have uniforms, but a couple of my younger cousins did. I still remember the family pitching in to buy uniforms that were at least 2-3 sizes too big for the oldest and then those with the best sewing skills hemmed/took in the various bits so they'd fit that year. Every time she had a growth spurt, there'd be a "letting out" party of making the stuff fit until there was nothing left to let out. And then they'd buy her a new set to start over & take her old kit back "in" for her younger sister (or friends of the family at the same school). I've also helped with the "taking in/letting out" for kids of friends who have uniforms.
Always stoked for “yu boi jimmy” hahaha
✨️ KACHOW ✨️
WhAt’s PoPpIn’? 🔥🔥🔥
@@TheWelshViking I was certain you filmed that bit when your knee pain had subsided but pain meds were still ✨effective✨ 😂😂😂
One of the things I value that I inherited from my grandmother is her sewing box. When it came to me it was full of things for mending: thread, needles, elastic, poppers, hooks-and-eyes, bias tape etc. :)
My biggest problem nowadays is how cheaply made all clothing is, even the most expensive pieces. I try caring for them as best as I can, washing everything on delicate, hanging to dry, repairing everything, etc, but they still start looking ratty after a year or two. And don't get me started on the shoes T-T
A stitch in time saves nine!! I was reminded of Japanese boro stitching. I read a textile book once that claimed that once a piece was worn out it was thrown away. I almost threw the book away!! It would have been shared around with every family member of a suitable size, and then cut up to make kids clothes. And as it got thinner and softer it would have been made into baby clothes, nappies, and scraps used as rags. A few years ago I went to a Trench Art Quilt exhibit. In a side room was a "Wagga" quilt, opened out to show worn out baby clothes sewn in as wadding. Modern 'make-do- and-mend has nothing on the past!
Why would you want to look like tattered rags when you can look like a patchwork quilt! 12:18 That tunic looks so cool!
17:39 I definitely relate to this bit; just a few weeks back, I went from "I'll *try* and buy secondhand, if I can" to "the only things I'll buy new for my kids and I are undergarments."
“I don’t want to see you look like a hedgehog. You’re just … brown … with rust.”
🦔🦔🦔
Oh I got a little hole in my dress, what should I do? Go out in the field, sow some flax, wait for it to grow, harvest, soak, heckle, spin, weave and sew a new one - or should I just mend the hole?
I just started repairing my own clothing because I suffer from the curse of Thick Thighs rubbing the inside of my favorite jeans down to nothing. But the euphoria of having clothes that fit you and are comfortable and then being able to sew a braid to reinforce a hem, or darning a patch of fabric that's getting too thin is just too amazing for words. I recently found out how to fix a hole in the top of my second-favorite pair of shoes, and it feels amazing to look down and see stitching done in my own hand!
People tend forget quickly. I seen corset with 3 fabrics, I seen stunning silk dresses with 20 patches. I remember how my gran and mum patch my dresses, my gran was the best, she made flowers as patches. My gran also wore her wedding dress as her going out dress, it had been dyed blue and hem shorten and she was buried in it. Yes, when it comes to look poor, people thinks it being tattered clothes ( seen rich kids pretend to be poor) , while poor try their best to keep their clothes perfect and patch.
Gotta love the daft excuses that reenactors come up with to excuse a crappy job. That could be a video all on its own, to be honest.
Shall we compile all the ones we hear this season and compare notes?
I think we should!
So good to hear someone talking common sense about people in the past. In my history sessions in schools my usual answer to things like 'they all wore tatty clothes' is 'and why would they do that? '
My mom will be 87 soon. It's humorous to have one of the Grands or Greats (male or female) walk into her house with jeans purchased with huge holes in them. 🤭 ..."In MY day it was disgraceful to go out in public with holes in your clothes! We would have NEVER thought of such!! And we were poor! What do you mean you bought them like that? Lord have mercy!" ...and I agree with her. LOL
Old sailors used to call it "A patch on a patch with a patch in between."
One of my favorite Am Rev/ ACW pieces of kit I take with me is my "housewife" as made by tradition, sewed by my Mom. She's no longer with us, so it's a highly important piece of kit for me
Guess why there aren’t many clothes left over from centuries ago? They were remade, then made into other clothes. From there they were handed down to poorer family or servants or made into children’s clothes. From there sold or remade into other items. Fabric that was handmade was cherished and valued. The army valued their laundresses, as fleas in uniforms were terrible. I remember an anecdote about them pressing the fleas dead in seams of woollen kilts. A valued service. Some soldiers even knitted their own socks, my great uncles did.
I remember my grandmother teaching me to sew up runs in nylons in the 80s, because in the 30s and 40s stockings were valuable and you kept them as long and as well as you could.
A while ago, I found a (Polish) contraption for mending stockings in a charity shop. A sort of tiny hook that extends out of a handle and back in to make catching the stitches easier, allegedly. (And then soon after I had to stop wearing them altogether because I have atopic ecsema and my skin decided it can't stand nylons anymore...)
So yeah, mending them was so widespread that a commercial tool for it was made!
Especially northern Europeans (vikings) were very handy with the sewing needle.
It was a universal skill among men and women. Everybody took care of their stuff, because h&m didn't exist and cloth was a lot more expensive than twine.
I started sewing my own stuff for medieval reenactment / living history. Mostly, because the stuff I make fits and is not made of cotton.
THANK YOU for making this video! I spin and weave and sew, and it's very time consuming. For most of history, most people only had one or two outfits because cloth was very time consuming to make by hand, and thus very expensive. OF COURSE you would repair rather than replace. Also, if you are out on campaign and can't get out of the weather, having sturdy clothes in good repair can be a matter of life or death; look at all the soldiers who died of tranch foot in WWI just for want of dry socks.
Speaking of socks, it takes me about thiry hours to knit a pair of socks and DAMNED STRAIGHT I darn them when they get holes.
By the way, you look great, and you seemed pretty cheerful in this video. I hope that means your brain is doing better.
Yes! Same goes for the 18th century, and into the 19th too, things are patched and pieced and fabric is re-used all the time!
There are quite a few extant waistcoats that started off as longer, earlier styles, and were later cut down and updated to later fashions (some with embroidery that makes the alteration Very obvious). There's a purse made from parts of a waistcoat, multiple early Victorian dressing gowns made from 18th century dress silk, breeches made from a quilted petticoat, and at least 3 examples of late 18th century court waistcoats/suits being recut to be late 19th century women's wear. Plus loads of dresses that were remade from much older ones.
18th century dresses were often altered multiple times to update the silhouette & trim, because fabric was EXPENSIVE and goddammit you were going to get as much use out of it as possible!
When her husband volunteered at the beginning of the American Civil War, my 3rd great grandmother (with a 1 year old!) went along in the wagon train as a laundress for the Colonel and other regimental officers.
After the battle of Perryville, KY, she was over it and her husband walked back to PA with her and the baby, technically AWOL, but the Colonel liked her so much the story goes that he was understanding when her husband returned and he faced no repercussions.