BrambleStitches

I have taken on a new project, and I’m so excited about it. A client approached me with the idea of transforming some of her old clothes into something else. What else, exactly, is up to me.

I finally had a chance to take a good look at the things she sent today. These are mostly heavy-weight, long sleeved shirts and over shirts, and mostly neutral colors. Beautiful quality, but all are damaged in some way.

Do you see these? I’ve got to know the story with all those sweaters! I just giggled when
I saw that every one of them had a chunk missing on the back. At first
I thought, "gee, one of her dogs must have snagged this." Then when I
saw the second one I thought, "hmm… I wonder if she sits in a sort of
broken chair that sometimes pinches her clothes." And then I thought,
"maybe this is some sort of strange secret society initiation… cut a
chunk out of clothing at every meeting…" (Okay, so I didn’t really
think that.) Now the only conclusion I can make is that these are store
returns, and the little chunk got mailed back to the manufacturer. What
a score, though! They’re beautiful!

I went to the source to find the real story:

[condensed] "My husband runs a very large catalog company group. Two years ago- he asked me to quit my
job to come help open
a store in his building to sell the products that were returned and/or
non-refurbishable for resale. So- I got the first pick of many many
things- clothes were a major influx into mine and my friends lives for
about 9 months.

However- I also got the first pick
(I love being the boss’ wife) from the "perfect sample room"- this is
where they kept a perfect sample of any item sold in the catalog.
Sometimes there were items that were discontinued from the catalog so
they would be removed froom the perfect sample room. Well- if there was
a hole in stuff (which the manufacturer would do to prevent the sale of
the extra item included into the shipment)- we couldnt sell it really-
as we did try to have a nice store. But I couldnt bear to part with
clothes that only had a small hole in the back. I tried to be cool
about wearing them- saying things like "I dont care" or "no one will
notice"… But alas, both statements we not true.

Well, I was
always given those clothes free- I vowed to fix them myself with bits
of material that I bought from walmart in the discount bin- but never
did it.

The co-workers used to make
fun of me because I would dig in the garbage to pull out the shirts
with holes after a newbie would have thrown them away. Pants were saved
as well. I figured I could always cut them off for shorts.

And that is the story of how most of the clothes I
send you will have holes. Or rips, or tears. I should have made a very
creative one up about dogs chasing me and ripping out bits from my
back…."

Sewing