Restoration Hardware

Read this article in our print magazine, CRAFT 04: Costumes, Page 64.
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Bring a vintage garment back to life with custom metalwork.

by Kent Bell, Christine Haynes

SEW ON THE BUTTON

Before sewing your new button to the vintage garment, find the spot where the old button was located and clean the location by removing all old and excess threads.
Thread your needle with the thread of your choice. Cut at least 24" of thread. Feed the thread through the needle eye and loop back until the two ends of the thread meet. Knot the two ends together a couple of times to create a secure knot. Now you have a double thick thread and can do twice the work in each pass. Enter your needle from the back of the fabric, through the garment to the front. Pull tight. The double knot should act as a stopper.
Feed the needle up through the top left buttonhole and pull tight. Poke your needle down through the bottom left buttonhole, making sure that you return through the garment close to the first entry. This will keep the inside as clean as possible. Before pulling tight, take a toothpick, cocktail sword, or wooden match and slide it between the loop of thread and the face of the button.
Feed the needle from the inside to the front through the top right buttonhole, and return through the bottom right buttonhole, looping over the cocktail sword again. Pull your thread tight to secure the button close to the garment. Repeat this at least 4 times for each side. When you have completed these passes, feed the needle back through the garment, from the inside to the front, as if you were going to go through a buttonhole, but instead, pull the needle and thread out from behind the button.
Remove your cocktail sword by sliding it to the left or right. Lift your button up, using the slack gained from removing the cocktail sword. Take the needle and thread and wind it tightly 5-6 times around all the threads that are holding the button on between the front of the garment and the back of the button. Finally, keeping your thread tight, poke your needle back through the garment.
To finish and secure the threads, pass your needle once through the fabric of the garment near the other threads on the inside. Do this same thing a second time, but while the needle is halfway through, wind the thread around the needle 3 times. Finish the knot by holding the wound threads close to the garment while pulling the needle through. Pass through one last time to lock in the wound threads and cut.

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