Most of us buy leather jackets and pants from our favorite stores, which means that we have to buy them just as they are.
Sometimes, we might not be able to find a jacket that we love instantly because the design isn’t what we were expecting.
Unlike other shirts, skirts or dresses, it is not always possible to make our preferred designs or edits on leather. At least, it’s not possible without having the right machine or tools.
How Can You Make Changes to Your Leather?
If you’ve just bought a very well-cut and designer leather jacket, you don’t really have to wear it just as it comes from the store.
It is very much possible to make most kinds of amendments to your jacket easily. You won’t even need a sewing machine in most cases.
Most of the time, you can buy patches that you can easily glue to your leather jackets and pants.
You won’t need to sew on these patches to make them durable or permanent; most patches can be glued to your leather jacket or pants, or ironed on.
With most store-bought patches, it is possible to glue them to your leather clothes and accessories without any kind of problem in the future.
At the same time, they can be ironed-on to your leather jacket or pants without the patches falling off or getting loose in the future.
You can also make your own designs on a separate patch of fabric by embroidering on it using an embroidery machine or by hand, and then attach them to your leather jacket or pants.
Big or small, you can attach any store-bought or homemade patches to your leather clothes.
For attaching any patches to your leather clothes, you might need some heavy-duty permanent glue, a heat gun, a household iron and a non-stick scissor.
Each patch for your leather clothes is different. Some require to be glued to your leather clothes while others need to be ironed on or attached with a heated glue gun.
The processes are relatively simple with easy to follow instructions that come with the patches themselves.
Can You Sew Patches to your Leather Clothes?
Apart from using a glue gun, heavy duty permanent glue, or iron to attach patches to your leather jackets and pants, the best and the most permanent way to attach them is by sewing the patches to the leather.
This is also a pretty easy and fast way to add some customized patches to your leather clothes so that you would never have to worry about the glue drying off and the patches falling down after a few days.
You can sew your embroidered patches to your leather jackets or pants with a sewing machine or by hand using a heavy-duty needle.
Even if you don’t have a sewing machine or if you are not a regular crafter or sewing enthusiast, you can simply use your hands for sewing the patches to the clothes.
It is very important to remember that sewing patches to your leather clothes will leave holes on them, which will be visible after you remove the patches.
Even when you use extremely fine needles to make careful stitches, the holes made on leather would be visible afterward unless you cover them up with another bigger patch of design.
How to Sew Design Patches to Leather by Hand?
If you are using your hands to sew the patches to the leather, you need to use a relatively thicker and heavy-duty needle for the job.
At the same time, you’ll also need to use sturdy nylon or polyester thread for the stitches. The thread also needs to be transparent but strong and unbreakable at the same time.
For sewing your patches to your leather jackets or pants, these are the steps you have to follow:
- First of all, you have to first lay down the cloth on a table or any other furniture with a flat surface.
- Next, decide where you want to place the patch. If it is a big one, remove the patch from the packet it comes in and place it tentatively on the place you want to attach it on your leather jacket or pants. It is important that the patch doesn’t fall on any of the joints or stitches of the cloth, but on a flat surface. Otherwise, you might not be able to sew the patch to the jacket properly.
- Then, pin the patch to the leather jacket or pants exactly where you want to sew it. Remember to place the pin where the holes made from the pin would be later covered by the patch itself.
- Choose any of the sides and start making stitches to attach the patch to the jacket or the pants. You can use any basic stitch that is used for sealing the edges of clothes or trimming clothes. Be careful that the stitches are closely attached to the patches and not too far from where the patch ends.
- When you’ve stitched enough to keep the patch attached to the leather, remove the pins. Keep on stitching until you’ve completed stitching around the edges of the entire design.
A single stitch is enough to securely attach the patch to your leather jacket or pants but if the design itself is too heavy or too big, you can repeat your stitches to cover the whole thing twice.