Last week, I was working on a crochet project that I pick up every once in a while when I’m in a lull between other projects. I managed to finish several rows before I looked down and realized I had made a mistake even further back than my work from that day.
It was not a large mistake (only one single crochet that was accidentally worked into the row below in a fingering weight project), and it was not glaringly obvious (the color of the yarn is a dark teal, so the stitches don’t even show up that much).
Nevertheless, I immediately faced the question of whether I should rip back several hours of work to fix it. Because otherwise, it wouldn’t be PERFECT.
I’m sure you’ve experienced this dilemma yourself. It’s the age-old question all crafters inevitably face–do I fix the mistake, or leave it?
And as I was considering what to do with my own project, I began to wonder where this impulse to make my project “perfect” was coming from.
I’ve thought about this idea of “perfection” before and the ways that our ideas of perfection have been shaped (dare I say warped) by our modern, industrial world.
Now, my wife and I love to hate on the Industrial Revolution. Among the plethora of good reasons for this (don’t get me started) is that it made possible the mass production of flawless (or nearly so) goods by machine. This may have been “good for business,” but I surmise that it has also shaped our ideas around perfection and our sense of the value and purpose of craftsmanship.¹
I think when a lot of us use the word “perfect” we generally mean “flawless” or “without blemish.” In the context of handmade items, and especially clothing, I realized that my idea of what is perfect is shaped largely by my experience of clothing made in a factory or by machine. We’re used to flawless garments because the brands that produce most of our clothing throw out as waste anything that has a flaw.
How many of us have experienced, to our chagrin, the backhanded compliment, “Oh! You made that? It looks storebought.” As if factory-made clothing is the standard by which all other garments are judged!
But this has not always been the case. As I was pondering my previously unexamined attitudes about this, I was reminded of one pre-industrial culture in which perfection was not the goal of making.
There was a book I read way back in grade school that included a story about traditional Hopi weavers. The story mentioned that they would intentionally weave mistakes into their work.
Remembering this, I decided to do a little bit of research. What I learned was that an array of cultures from various eras of history have included intentional imperfections in their work. From Hopi and Navajo weavers and Punjab embroiderers to Japanese potters and medieval Christian architects, artisans and craftsmen throughout history and across the globe have included intentional “mistakes” in their work as a way of acknowledging their humanity and their finitude.¹
These reflections reminded me why I choose to dye with natural dyes. I love that they can be unpredictable, that the colors come out not perfectly even, and that sometimes the skeins end up less than flawless. I also love that this yarn sometimes leaves its mark on my hands as I work with it.
These qualities are all reminders that I am working with materials from nature and that this work requires a spirit of humility and receptivity to what nature provides. I must not fall prey to the delusion that I can control the natural order of things (an assumption that much of modern life seems to take for granted), but I must instead find my place and work within it.
So the next time you find a mistake in your work, consider letting it remain as a testament to the beauty of something made by hand. It may not be flawless, but it will be perfect.
