BERNINA Corporate Blog -
Good morning, dear friends! Today’s tutorial is all about shortening kids’ pants. Instead of sewing new ones from scratch, we’re giving worn-out or damaged long pants a second life by turning them into cool summer shorts. This is a quick and practical upcycling method—perfect for pants with holes or thin fabric around the knees. I’ll show you how easy it is to transform them while giving each pair a unique look.
Materials Overview
You will need:
- Kids’ jeans with holes for upcycling projects
- Patches and labels as needed
- Thread used: Denim Doc by Amann Mettler
In the jeans, the hole was unfortunately positioned right on the seam of the pleats, and the blue pants — which is hard to see here — had many small holes, making the fabric around the knee very thin. One of the holes was quite high up, so I decided to add a patch along with shortening.
First, if your patch is iron-on, press it onto the hole of the shorts according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Since I know it doesn’t last long for my boys, I secure it by stitching around it as well. For this, I remove the extension table to use the free arm. I lower the feed dogs and attach the Quilting Foot #29, which makes it easy to sew all around the patch.
Shortening Kids’ Pants
Next, fold the legs twice up to the desired length and press well. Then sew a narrow topstitch all around. For these pants, I didn’t have matching Denim Doc thread, so I used regular sewing thread, which worked well too.
I did the same for the jeans, using denim thread. I like to sew over the seam twice for extra durability.
If you want to give the shorts a unique look, you can also add a label or similar decoration on the hem.
Congratulations, your shortened shorts are ready! We think they look casual and cool, and the boys love wearing them.
Especially if it was a favorite pair of pants that must not disappear, this is a great way to keep wearing them through the summer.
I wish you lots of fun reducing your holey pants pile!
Warmly,
Sara
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