My cashmere. It has holes.

December 31, 2021 11:46 AM

I thought I successfully battled the evil moths with many, many cedar balls. The moths laughed...

and feasted on my many, many cashmere (and few other wool) sweaters. Now I have at least a dozen in various colors that I need to figure out how to deal with.

I've seen people just wear sweaters with the holes and tears in them and I dig the 'I give zero fucks' look, but I need to make it look...more intentional if I'm going to do that. How is that accomplished with a sweater without making it completely unravel?

I'm not really an embroidery person - at least not flowers. I could maybe do other stuff, but I have a hard time holding needles for an extended period of time (psoriatic arthritis).

Patching? Darning? In some sweaters, it's just a tiny hole in an obvious place. Others, it's a whole damn constellation.

Make a blanket or scarf or something?

It makes me so sad. I thought I'd have those sweaters for a long time.


And yes, I do have the no-rinse wool wash stuff. Fucking moths.

posted by dancinglamb to Clothing, Beauty, & Fashion (11 answers total)

Darning is incredibly easy to get the hang of, and swiss darning isn't impossible (it picks up the broken knit & blends into the original material—if you're able to match the color and gauge of yarn, no easy task on fine wool knits!). Spend a while on Pinterest or Instagram looking for examples of cute darns, & I'll try to come back here and post a few good links later.
posted by knucklebones at 11:59 AM on December 31, 2021

My husband recently took up darning and just tackled a cashmere sweater with many, many tiny holes. He went invisible and you cannot tell at all where he mended it.

He's recently acquired this book on visible darning (other darning supplies can be gotten at that link too) which might spark some inspiration.
posted by damayanti at 12:28 PM on December 31, 2021

Japanese concept of Sashiko -- intentionally visible mending is a fun and not challenging way to handle this.
posted by mmf at 1:02 PM on December 31, 2021

A fiber artist friend of mine sells cute visible mending kits with yarn and instructions.
posted by doift at 1:29 PM on December 31, 2021

I recommend using Bo-Nash sweater mending kit. It's super easy and inexpensive. All you need is the kit and an iron.
posted by jennstra at 1:50 PM on December 31, 2021

If darning sounds too hard, maybe WoolFiller is a good option. It's a simple way to visibly repair woolen garments by felting.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:53 PM on December 31, 2021

Side note: cedar balls don't do diddly. You need an extensive poisoning campaign, sweaters in airtight boxes, and luck. My deepest sympathies. Moths fucking suck!
posted by praemunire at 2:10 PM on December 31, 2021

Felting is a good way to repair moth-holes - you can either match colours or use a contrast. It's easy to do, after a little practice, and much less fiddly than embroidery. Be sure to work from both sides and be careful not to stretch the fabric. I bought a little kit on eBay, with a dozen different colours of wool and a couple of needles
Moths seem to find cashmere especially tasty and yes, cedarwood balls are pretty ineffective. Availability differs between countries, but blocks or papers that release insecticide are really the only effective way. Give the clothes a really good shake or brush before putting them away in a sealed plastic bag with the insecticide block.
posted by Fuchsoid at 4:23 PM on December 31, 2021

Darning! I often just use close-colored embroidery floss, because that's what I have at home, split it so it's not so thick, and it works like a charm. Depending on the color it may be invisible or show as a slightly different texture. Usually not that noticeable if I can color match well.
posted by sumiami at 8:23 PM on December 31, 2021

I'm going to be all team "cashmere doesn't need visible repairs, it's cashmere" - but everybody do you if that's what you're into.

Here are some ideas:

- Add pockets

- Use one of the worst sweaters as pocket/replacement material for the others, assuming everything is in the same color scheme

- If you do add pockets or cannibalize one of the sweaters, see if you can find a really skilled professional. I'm not above using the local search feature of Etsy to find a skilled seamstress or knitter, but surveying the local tailors/alterations people is a good place to start

- I'd consider gluing some other fabric/interfacing _inside_ a sweater hole, to prevent fraying, and then putting a brooch over the hole. Depending on the sweater, I might consider making a long band that goes over my shoulder or something, so that the brooch won't weigh down that one point and droop toward the floor

- FABRIC GLUE for attaching mending patches _inside_ the sweater. Be careful to use the right amount -- look for a YouTube or other tutorial on how to do this. I just did it for some jeans with a teeny hole in the bottom, but they were jeans and I didn't care about them that much, so I didn't study up first. For your cashmere sweaters, I'd study up.
posted by amtho at 11:08 PM on December 31, 2021

So glad you posted this, and for the answers, I just saved 2 sweaters! Thank you!
posted by Dashy at 4:22 PM on January 3, 2022