Moth damage.

[Melcombe]

Allow me to start with a small but heartfelt scream.

*screams*

Thank you.

My - almost new - SB patch pocket blazer (in Dugdales navy basketweave) has acquired a moth hole, small (about 2mm) but noticeable, in a prominent place on the forearm.

I have only worn it a very few times, but took it with me to a hotel where I think the mothy deed was done, or at least the culprit pounced (do moths pounce? - no matter). I keep all my suits and coats in garment bags in a dry and well heated room with regular doses of Orphea salvalana strips. For years this seems to have been a successful preventative.

I'd like to draw on the hive brain of LL'ers on a couple of points.

1 - Do I get it invisibly mended, or should I ask my tailor to make a new sleeve? The jacket appears new and new replacement cloth (if it matches colour exactly...) would / should not look odd.

2 - Having found one moth hole, Im dreading finding others, but equally determined to boost defences. What else should I be doing on the anti-moth front? Do moth traps work? Is there a better repellent than salvalana?

All advice gratefully received.

[old henry]

(212)-840-7657. That is the contact for Alice Zotta re-weaving in Manhattan. Not sure if they are still in business. She, herself, is long gone but one of her girls may have taken over.

[L.deJong]

I did some google searching on Alice Zotta, and the last reviews where not that pretty. Apparently when she left the place turned into a less dedicated shop.
https://www.judysbook.com/ZottaAlice-Re ... 519571.htm

[old henry]

Thats not surprising at all. Keep in mind also the today's cloth is not as conducive to re-weaving.

[Melcombe]

... Keep in mind also the today's cloth is not as conducive to re-weaving.

Sound advice. On reflection, I suspect that if I'd worn it more instead of keeping for special outings, the darn moths might not have gotten a foothold in the undisturbed environment. Lesson learned !

I am planning to call in to the tailor's on Monday to seek his advice - Dugdales have plenty of the original bolt available, so if he's willing a new sleeve might be in order. Looking at it in strong sunlight, I've noticed that in addition to the small hole theres a faint 20mm stain around it.

Failing that, (and since I'm not in NY until January) I was planning to go to http://www.invisible-mending.co.uk/retail/ a short walk from work. I've not used them before but they seem to have good reviews.

[arch]

It is worth putting your clothes in a deep freeze for a few days. Make sure they are wrapped in a plastic bag first. You can then spray your wardrobe.

Let me know how the Marylebone menders turn out - I have a tweed suit with a moth hole in the trousers that requires repair. Good luck!

[old henry]

Also, any drop of soup or wine will be a spot the moths will munch.

[Concordia]

Dry ice is often helpful. Kills moths, larvae, eggs. You can put large blocks in a semi-sealed closet, or lunch bags full of cubes into garment bags. Or intermediate amounts into ice chests that hold archived cloths.

I've found that Without a Trace in Chicago does well-- the Savile Row shops often know people even better than that. You could call your tailor to compare prices of the different choices.

[snapper]

Melcombe the Invisible Mending Company did a great job for me on a tweed overcoat a year ago and at an acceptable price. I took a Harris Tweed jacket in to them two days ago and they quoted £144 for a 12mm diameter hole. So I would say that if your tailor does not make a new sleeve then the I. Mend Co would be a good answer.

Regards,
Snapper

[ggreen]

Melcombe,

French American Re-Weaving
19 W 57th St #1406, New York, NY 10019
Phone: (212) 765-4670

I used them many time. Great work. It would help if you have at least a little bit of the same cloth for them to use. 2mm hole is not worth a new sleeve in my opinion.

Greg

[couch]

+1 for French American, if they are still operating. I haven't needed them in several years, but they did superb work on more than one garment for me.

However, if there's a noticeable 20mm stain around the moth hole, then it's likely something (coffee, soup, who knows) attractive to moths was there first. Unless it can be thoroughly spot-cleaned, it will be a lure for more moth larvae and no longer a perfect color match for the rewoven patch. So if the tailor still has the original bolt, your pocketbook can stand it, and you trust the current coatmaker or "doctor" at the firm, the perfectionist option is to remake the sleeve (assuming the jacket has not been dry cleaned enough to affect the color and surface tooth). Otherwise ask the tailor to spot clean it for you and embark on the reweaving journey. Usually reweavers take their patch material from inlay somewhere in the garment.

I've posted here before my own anti-moth practices; a search should find them. Moth traps that work using a pheromone lure on sticky surfaces are helpful as a) a warning that moths are active and b) a first line of defense to catch a few before they find your clothes, but they're not reliable on their own. Your instinct to shift and brush regularly is right on the money (moth eggs are not strongly attached and fall off easily), and whatever you can do to keep humidity low will pay off most of all.

Vox has a skylight in his dressing room and his clothes racks are open rather than enclosed in closet or wardrobe doors; I presume his place also has central air conditioning so humidity is regulated. That is his entire moth prevention regimen. I sometimes worry that he might suffer some differential fading on the side of the clothes open to the room, but presumably he's thought of that and uses UV filtering on skylight and windows.

[snapper]

Melcombe what was the final outcome?

Regards,
Snapper

[Melcombe]

Melcombe what was the final outcome?

Regards,
Snapper

Thanks for asking.

As it happens, I visited my tailor yesterday and spoke with him at some length about the options.

At this point, I do rather wish I'd taken a picture of the hole and the slight discolouration around it to illustrate the point. The light was very good in his workroom and the discolouration even more marked than I'd first supposed.

His view was that an invisible mend would be a good option, subject to 2 points.

1 The coat is very nearly new and the fabric still looks as new. I think I described it as basket weave - it isn't - it's hopsack (Dugdales 9428). The damage is in a very prominent place on the right forearm. An invisible mend is likely to be good and almost invisible - but I shall know it's there.

2 The discolouration might actually be more of a problem. On an older coat it might not even notice - and one would hope that it would clean out with a good dry cleaner's efforts. But there's a possibility that it is permanent.

Taking this into account, I decided to go for the nuclear option, and he is making a new sleeve. I'm looking forward to seeing the result.

The whole episode is more than a bit annoying. The blazer is a copy of one that I inherited (okay, I borrowed it from an indulgent uncle 20+ years ago and never got round to giving it back…) And it has served me particularly well down the years. The hopsack fabric of the old original has simply got better and better with age and wear. My hope remains that the Dugdale's fabric in the new version will be a reasonable match for the old. I appreciate that things ain't what they used to be, but I thought it was worth a try; certainly the new fabric has more substance to it than you might expect. I even went to the extent of acquiring a set of Benson & Clegg buttons to match the originals – again the more 'wabi sabi' these old ones got, the better they looked.

What is particularly galling is that the old original (which I can't quite bring myself to get rid of) was hanging right next to the new version in my closet. Needless to say the old version remains completely unmolested (unmoth-lested ?).

This is the new version, pre-moth, on the day of its delivery

[old henry]

Great shoulder , sleeve , balance , and most of all a beautifully set collar.

[Melcombe]

Great shoulder , sleeve , balance , and most of all a beautifully set collar.

I shall pass on your kind comments - he will really appreciate them.