Mending in Public: How We’re Bringing Denim Repair to the Heart of Cambridge

What if instead of buying new jeans, you learned to love the ones you already have — holes and all? That’s the question at the heart of our Learn Sashiko campaign, and it’s one we’ve been asking out loud, in public, right here in Cambridge.

From Clare Hall College to the Grand Arcade shopping centre, we’ve been bringing repair culture to people where they are. Not in a specialist studio. Not behind a paywall. In the places people already go: to study, to shop, to wander.

What Is the Learn Sashiko Campaign?

Learn Sashiko is our ongoing initiative to teach members of the public how to repair denim by hand and to show that repair doesn’t have to be invisible, hurried, or shameful. It can be slow, deliberate, and beautiful.

Through free and accessible workshops, we introduce people to Sashiko: a Japanese hand-stitching technique built on simple running stitches arranged into geometric patterns. Originally used to reinforce and mend workwear, Sashiko turns the act of repair into something worth displaying, a design feature. The stitches don’t hide the damage — they emphasise the fix.

Our workshops are hands-on from the start. No experience needed. You sit down, pick up a needle, and by the end of an hour you’ve stitched your first patch of denim. It’s that straightforward — and that satisfying.

The Technique: Sashiko Explained

Sashiko (literally “little stabs” in Japanese) is one of the most beginner-friendly hand-stitching methods there is. You work with a long needle, thick cotton thread, and a simple in-out running stitch — the same stitch you’d use to sew on a button, just repeated with intention.

What makes sashiko distinctive is its geometry. Traditional patterns — like asanoha (hemp leaf), seigaiha (overlapping waves), or simple grids — emerge from nothing more than consistent spacing and a steady hand. The white thread on indigo fabric is the classic look, but sashiko works on any denim, in any colour.

For denim repair specifically, sashiko is ideal. It reinforces weak or damaged fabric from the back while creating a decorative surface on the front. A crotch tear, an inner thigh hole, a worn knee — all of these become canvases. The repaired area is often stronger than the original denim.

Where We’ve Been: Clare Hall & the Grand Arcade

The Learn Sashiko campaign has taken us to two very different kinds of space — and that contrast is intentional.

At Clare Hall College, we’ve worked with one of Cambridge’s most forward-thinking academic communities. Clare Hall has a long-standing commitment to sustainability and interdisciplinary thinking, and our workshop there brought together students, researchers, and staff around a shared table and a shared craft. It’s the kind of environment where people ask good questions — about fast fashion, about material culture, about why we stopped mending things in the first place.

At the Grand Arcade, the audience is completely different — and that’s the point. Shoppers who weren’t planning to think about sustainability stopped to watch, then stayed to stitch. Families pulled up chairs. People brought in jeans they’d been meaning to throw away. The shopping centre setting made repair visible in a context where disposal is the default — and that visibility matters.

Together, these two venues represent something we believe deeply: repair culture belongs everywhere. In lecture halls and shopping centres. In academic communities and on the high street.

Why It Matters

Denim is one of fashion’s most resource-intensive products. A single pair of jeans requires around 7,000 litres of water to produce, plus significant energy, chemicals, and labour. Most pairs are worn fewer than ten times before being discarded.

Repair is the simplest possible intervention. It doesn’t require a new supply chain, a recycling facility, or a policy change. It requires a needle, some thread, and the knowledge that it’s worth doing.

That’s what the Learn Sashiko campaign is really about: giving people that knowledge, and the confidence to act on it. Every pair of jeans repaired instead of replaced is a small win — and small wins, at scale, add up.

What’s Next

We’re continuing to grow the Learn Sashiko campaign — bringing workshops to more venues, more communities, and more people who’ve never picked up a needle in their lives. If you’re a business, institution, or community space in Cambridge (or beyond) and you’d like to host a session, we’d love to hear from you.

And if you’re not ready to stitch your own jeans just yet — that’s what we’re here for. Repair My Denim is a fully postal denim repair service: you send us your jeans, we repair them using the same techniques we teach, and send them back good as new. Or better, actually.