DIY patches for well-loved shoes

Harlow has these shoes, shoes that I really love. But they have seen better days, the toddler wear and tear has left them looking..pretty rough. I am not quite ready to let them go without a fight, so I thought I’d patch the well worn parts. This is what I did (this would be great for your own well loved shoes too!

• Shoes (they don’t have to be worn, this would be great to do to any shoe)
• Scrap fabric (for your drape/pattern trace) *for best results; use fabric that is very close in quality to your final fabric.
• Final Fabric ( I used suede, durable and very easy to work with ). *I recommend leather since you are creating patches and leather does not fray, and conforms easy to shape.
• Scissors
• Pen/Pencil
• Small pain brush
• Glue. Plain white glue or carpenters glue work best. (pretty much exactly the same thing)

Lay your scrap piece of fabric (drape) over the place you want to patch. hold in place and begin drawing the base line (along the sole)

Roughly draw the shape you want to patch to be. Just lightly get the shape how you would like. Do this for all places you want to place patches.

Take the scrap fabric with your traced shapes and clean up your traced lines. Make everything smooth and even.

Ideally you would want to transfer your traced patch to paper and create a proper pattern. But your probably only going to use these pieces for this one pair of shoes, so just lay it directly over your final fabric (double layer if you want this piece to be on both shoes). Annnd Cut.

Prep your cut patches for glue. I just laid mine on a larger piece of the scrap fabric.

Glue. Put a small bit of glue in the center and use your brush to spread it evenly. Not too much as you don’t want to glue pouring out from behind the patch.

Place patch on shoe, I started with the base edge (sole edge), and used my nail to make sure it was close and tight to that seam, then the rest. I waited for each piece to dry completely they pulled at all the edges gently, any spot that lifted off I gave another dab of glue.

And that’s it! Basically a brand spanking new pair of shoes, and I think they are even cuter now!

I want to try this with Kingston and Chris’ worn Tom’s, since those always get really worn at the toes. I’m sure it will be alot trickier since they have those two folds at the toe, trickier but not impossible.

I think Harlow might only get a few more  wears out of these, since they are so close to being too small. But that’s ok, still totally worth it!

NOTE: This is only a temporary fix, but if the patch ever starts to peel…a quick dab of glue will do the trick! On a pair of adult shoes (since it will be easier to do on a bigger pair of shoes), you could do a little hand-stitch after the patch is glued in place.

I bought these shoes at Zara back in spring.

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