My favourite jacket is short and fitted, in crushed velvet. With three silk-covered buttons and a silk ribbon tie instead of buttons. It’s this fantastic dark olive green, exactly the same colour as the outside crust of a dried cow pat.
I love it, and it’s been a wardrobe staple for (I can’t believe it!) ten years.
Sadly the cuffs are slightly worn at the edges and I managed to get glue all over the bottom hem when I was too excited by a creative project to wait five minutes and change into something sensible. Duh.
I also have an equally ancient yet fabulous pencil skirt that fits perfectly, hangs beautifully and has a stain on the front.
Because I can’t bear to get rid of either of them yet, it’s time for some serious creative action. I’m not 100% sure what I want to do yet, but I have my materials at the ready. Here are 15 ways to cover up stains and damage on gorgeous jackets and skirts you love too much to throw out.
- add layers of lace, stating off at the hem and working upwards for a lovely, floppy, foppish and feminine look
- accessorise by sewing on loads of tiny pearl buttons…
- …or pearl beads, which you can pick up at good craft shops and habadashers: cream, white and coloured
- tiny glass bugle beads come in fantastic colours and you can get opalescent ones too. They’re fiddly to sew on but they look stunning
- try your hand with embroidery silks, creating a simple pattern like cross stitch or just neat lines of vivid colour travelling up your jacket or skirt to create pinstripes
- find a rubber stamp or two – I love the butterfly ones, they’re so girly – and use fabric paint to print flocks of butterflies
- use toning or contrasting 3d craft paints to draw on swirls and abstract lines, tiny circles, flowers or just dots. 3d glitter paints are particularly lovely, sparkly and rich
- embellish hems with stripes of velvet or silk ribbon attached with fabric glue
- you can buy beautiful miniature roses made of ribbon, which look stunning sewn on in bunches or singly
- tie ribbon into mini-bows and sew them on. Tartan bows look particularly funky at the cuffs and hem of a black skirt or jacket
- cut out patterns from fabric – flowers or swirls or whatever – and glue them on with fabric glue or sew them on with contrasting embroidery thread
- go crazy and tack on silk flower petals for an eccentric and unique look – dismantle the flowers first to remove the plastic bits, then either sew them back on in the right order or make up your own flowers
- Go hippy chic with patchwork panels in luscious velvets and patterned flock fabrics. I buy charity shop floppy velvet and flock shirts – popular in the ’90s – just to cut up for craft projects
- sew or iron-on ready-made applique fabric decorations. You can get sequinned union jacks, bows, flowers, bikes, animals… all sorts of crazy stuff. Your best bet is Ebay, unless you’re lucky enough to have a good independent haberdasher nearby
- cut out leather or suede shapes and glue them on with fabric glue: stars, flowers, spots, hearts…
PS. the picture shows a black velvet Marks & Spencer top that I managed to ruin and decided to decorate. I’ve saved its life used silk flower petals, miniature glue-on mirrors, 3d craft paint and glitter glues!