Restoration

Sometimes can go wrong

I have repaired hundreds and hundreds of bears and toys many have sold in my shops and many have gone home to their owners who have been thrilled and I receive many lovely cards and letters thanking me for my work. I had one lady who didn’t like the smile so she showed me a picture of him when he was young only to realize it was a completely different bear, and the smile was correct.

Recently I repaired a old bear for a lady, I replaced the body stuffing and replaced all the paw covers it had old slightly squashed head which I topped up with wood wool and repaired the seams, his head was back to its shape, this I did not want to change even though it was not symmetrical “Less is more”

I put in a pair of beautiful amber glass eyes they could not be pulled in too tightly as the backing cloth was weak and I did not want it to tear. I repaired the squeaker and then used a old soft cream thread to stitch the back up and gave him a clean.

Sadly the lady did not like his look she said his eye protruded on the right and the back stitch was the wrong colour. It was the correct colour as it was the same as he was made with it just showed up more as it was new against his old backing cloth. He had no fur left so the back stitch was now very visible as was the eye. I offered to redo them without any cost but this was refused and I could only accept that this was just a difference of opinion.

I can only learn from such an experience that the communication between myself and the customer is so important to get it right, old memories of a bear can be quite different to how the bear will look after restoration. So as this lady was not completely happy I will now be sending out a picture of your repaired bears before they go home, then I can rectify or explain why something has been done in that way it has. I hope this will make sure you are all 100% happy with your bears and toys. Looking at his pictures I still think he looks so much better what do you think?