As a clothing company, we know we are doing our job right if a customer's most worn and well-loved garment is one of ours! It's amazing how many clothes fill up our wardrobes these days, yet often, it's the same pieces we go back to time and time again, the trusty favourite jumper that fits just right, the overshirt that's just the perfect shade, the trousers that not only look great but are actually comfortable in all the right places too. With all this "wear" undoubtedly you can expect a degree of "tear", it doesn't matter how good the quality or how expensive your clothes are, if you are wearing them hundreds, if not thousands of times, there is going to be a need for repair at some point.

 Here at UW. we believe in the art of visible repair and it's long been our goal to promote a new perspective on the repair of clothing . We like to think that one day people across the world will wear their repairs as a badge of honour. All of this is one way Universal Works will prolong the life cycle of our garments, keep them out of landfill and ensure you get to wear those trusty favourites for longer. 

In this day and age, we recognise that not everyone has the equipment, skills, or frankly, the time, to get physical with a needle and thread, so we set ourselves the challenge of how we could make this process easier for customers, and the idea of the "Universal Re-Works. Visible Repair." service was born. As a first step we wanted to trial the service and so we opened up submissions to 10 customers and partnered up with local seamstress and entrepreneur Gay at Soul and Flare, who helped us transform the damaged garments via the art of visible repair.

Here's a visual diary of how the service went following the journey of one pair of cord trousers sent to us by UW. super fan Ally, aka @supersimbo.

“Those wear marks are the rich patina of life and love. ” 

David Keyte, Universal Works Co-founder.

 UW. customer Ally aka @super.simbo instagram is a go to, daily source of outfit inspo and we noticed he'd mentioned that his well-loved cord track pants were getting a little faded at the knees, so we asked him if he'd like to be part of a case study for the service so that we could report back to you lot on how its all been going.

“We have a three old son so I'm on my knees a lot playing with him and so on. The track pant style is so comfy as well and is the perfect fit for hanging out with a toddler and rolling around on the floor. I quite liked the worn look, but with cords, it's a little different to the fades you get on something like denim, so I was curious to find out what a repair/Re-Work could look like.” 

Ally, Universal Works Customer.

Our customer services team cycle the item to be re-worked to Gay at Soul and Flair. Bike - Toyko Bike.

Gay assesses the damage and considers how best to repair the garment based on the customers brief. 

For this re-work, Gay stitched some dead stock blue cord in the opposite direction over the worn area on the knee to add extra reinforcement.

 Here is a before and after of the visible repairs, we hope you will agree that Gay has managed to breathe some serious life back into those pants! 

We asked Ally for a short testimonial of the service and want he thought of his Re-Worked UW pants: 

“I love the re-work. It's really cool to have the knees patched with the cord running horizontally, it adds a nice unique look to them and gives them a new lease of life… And it [the service] was super quick as well. I'll definitely want to have other items re-worked in the future so as to make them last for as long as possible.”

Ally, Universal Works Customer.

Ally is not the only happy customer, we have received only positive feedback from those taking part and all were universally delighted with their Universal Re-Works: Visible Repair item. As for the future, we are still refining the process but in the meantime, keep your eyes peeled as there's more news to come on the "Universal Re-Works" service very soon.