[Themaintainers] Themaintainers Digest, Vol 125, Issue 3

[Richard Wheeler]

This is mostly anecdotal, but for what it is worth, my experience of the
conversation around repair of clothing and textiles is that it is more
centered on *enabling* repair than on *defending* a right to repair. For
example, the proliferation of repair cafés and other repair events
represents an attempt to make repair more widely available. Similarly, the
sewing and needlework subsections of craft sections in bookstores seem to
devote more shelf space to repair and reuse.

In my opinion, one of the biggest blockers to the repair of clothing and
textiles is not a defense of intellectual property "rights"—as in the case
of software for John Deere tractors—but the shrinking number of suppliers.
The large craft supplies chain JoAnn Fabrics went out of business in May of
last year, leaving only Michael's and Hobby Lobby as large chain store
choices, and smaller, local stores, when they exist at all, tend to be
specialized quilting or high-end knitting shops. I live in Los Angeles, and
you would think that I could find whatever I needed, but when I went out
looking for bobbins for a baseline Singer sewing machine earlier this year,
I ended up having to order them from Amazon because I could not find them in
a physical.

And then there is the question of repairing *machines*. Around the same
time I went looking for those bobbins, the timing on my machine went off.
After multiple YouTube videos and searches in three different local library
catalogues, I could not find instructions to reset the timing myself. There
are fewer and fewer sewing machine repair shops, and when I took the
machine in to one, the elderly proprietor suggested that it would cost more
to fix the machine than to buy a new one. She only sold high-end machines
for quilters. When I did the math comparing the cost of driving to a local
chain to purchase a baseline Singer vs having it shipped the next day on
Amazon, I realized that, again, Amazon was the best bad option that I had.

I wish I had more references for you than anecdotes, but perhaps this
indicates that there is an opportunity here for research sur le terrain.

Richard Wheeler <https://www.linkedin.com/in/richarduwheeler/>
richarduwheeler at gmail.com
347.661.8476


On Thu, Aug 13, 2026 at 9:00 AM <themaintainers-request at lists.stevens.edu>
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>    1. Right to repair and textiles ? pointers on existing work?
>       (Kobiljski Aleksandra)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 13 Aug 2026 12:28:54 +0200 (CEST)
> From: Kobiljski Aleksandra <aleksandra.kobiljski at ehess.fr>
> To: "<themaintainers at lists.stevens.edu>"
>         <themaintainers at lists.stevens.edu>
> Subject: [Themaintainers] Right to repair and textiles ? pointers on
>         existing work?
> Message-ID: <67321366.11904263.1786616934279.JavaMail.zimbra at ehess.fr>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-15"
>
>
>
> Dear Maintainers,
>
>
>
>
> I'm currently working on a piece examining how the EU's 2024 Right to
> Repair Directive excluded textiles from its scope, and I'm trying to map
> the wider landscape of right-to-repair scholarship and advocacy before
> finishing the argument.
>
>
>
>
> I'm far less familiar with the US side of this movement and its history
> but my impression so far is that textile and garments repair did not loom
> large; the movement has centered largely on tractors (the John Deere fight)
> and electronics (Apple, and related FTC action).
>
>
>
>
> If I'm missing relevant work - where right to repair has intersected with
> textiles specifically - I would very much appreciate pointers.
>
>
>
>
> Many thanks in advance,
> Aleksandra Kobiljski
>
> CNRS, France
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