Trying to fix a broken vase is a tricky and often unrewarding experience. While a gifted handful of people can repair one without any trouble at all, most of us end up making such a mess that we may as well just throw it away. And we would, if our fingers weren’t stuck together with super glue.

Whatever the level of your vase-fixing skills, chances are that you’re no way near the level of Charlotte Bailey. The Brighton-based artist turns broken vases into works of art and she doesn’t need glue to do it. Instead she sews them back together by mimicking a traditional Japanese mending technique known as Kintsugi.

“I was responding to a call-for-artists brief entitled ‘Mended Textiles’ and considering the ways in which I could respond,” Charlotte told Bored Panda. “Having already been aware of the ancient Japanese art of Kintsugi, I decided to replicate the process with my own stitched interpretation. The vases can take anything from 5 hours (the very small ones) to a good few days for the larger pieces.”

The traditional method uses gold, silver or platinum to stick the broken pieces back together, but Charlotte wraps each piece in fabric first before sewing them to their corresponding pieces using gold metallic thread. the vase will no longer be functional, but that’s the last thing you’ll care about when you take a look at the amazing results below.

More info: Charlotte Bailey

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