Stitch by stitch

A Vitebsk resident has built up a collection of legendary sewing machines, and dreams of creating a museum exhibition based on them

Businessman Yuri Sergeyev has long been fond of remaking old things into lamps. The search for the next base for the lamp marked the beginning of a new hobby — collecting pre-war sewing machines. So many of them have been collected in a year that they have occupied an entire apartment.

Yuri Sergeyev, collector from Vitebsk       

In search of the base

We met with Yuri at the art gallery At the Fountain on Suvorov Street in the regional centre. A variety of creative and offbeat lamps made of an iron, a corkscrew, a frying pan, a meat grinder, a clock, and a hat resembled the atmosphere of the exhibition hall. “There are enough people willing to buy them, but the atmosphere is not for sale,” Yuri noted.
We approached the next lamp. According to the master, that was the sewing machine that started it all. “I had an idea that it would be interesting to use an old sewing machine as a base for the lamp. When I started to get more of them, I realised that sewing machines were ‘alive’ and good in themselves. You do not need to make anything out of them. So I used a non-working copy for the lamp,” the collector shared his story. It turned out that the entire collection was housed in another place, so we headed to the location to admire the unusual exhibits first-hand.      

Model range

Yuri Sergeyev has allocated a one-room apartment to store his collection of sewing machines. The kitchen is used as a workshop where he reanimates new exhibits, while the living room serves as a museum. Sewing machines are everywhere — on the shelves and under them, on the right, on the left and in the middle of the room. All of them are captioned. In the corner of the room is a device that maintains the necessary microclimate, just like in a real museum. The main characters of the exhibition are the famous Singer sewing machines, although there are also copies of other brands. “It is the pre-war Singer, in cast iron, that is of special interest. After the war, the mass production of electric sewing machines began in different countries. There were a huge number of models, but all of them were standard,” the collector explained. 
Responding the question how long it took him to compile the collection, Yuri revealed, “It took me one year. In order to collect the pre-war model range, I purposefully searched for certain copies through advertisements in Belarus and Russia. Most of them are from western Belarus. The only exhibit missing from my collection is a children’s sewing machine.”

Intricacies of spelling

For those who still think that real Singers are spelt with the letter Z due to the well-known pronunciation, Yuri reminded the history of its origin, “According to some reports, the father of the founder of Adam Reisinger corporation emigrated to the United States from Germany and changed his surname to a ‘less German-like’, shortening it to Singer. According to the rules of the German language, the letter S between or before vowels is pronounced as Z. Therefore, we spell Singer but read ‘Zinger’. That is how it established.” 
Singer Corporation was set up in New York and had branches in different countries. Each copy of the sewing machine has its number plate, which can be used to determine where and when the item was made. In Podolsk, Russia, sewing machines with the Russified Singer logo were produced. 
Singer conducted an advertising campaign around the world. Since 1905, a series of postcards with Russian proverbs was released in Russia. The collector showed a postcard with the caption: ‘In the house where they work hard, abundance flows, but in the house of lazy people, emptiness crawls’. Among the exhibits of the home museum, there are also a few instructions on how to use sewing machines.

Unraveling the threads

When Yuri plunged into the new field, he decided to study the biography of Isaac Singer. The book Unraveling the Threads, which the collector dubbed the ‘Bible by Singer’, helped him understand better the personality of the famous entrepreneur.
It turned out that the enterprising American had never studied anywhere. He performed in the theatre, and the ‘Singer’ surname suited perfectly for concert activities. He also patented a couple of inventions which did not bring him success, though. In 1851, Isaac Singer did something that turned the world upside down. “Singer did not invent the sewing machine, but he put together the best what had been invented before him, improved and added a few things. So he replaced the curved horizontal needle with a straight vertically moving one, abandoned vertical fabric orientation, came up with a convenient platform, a presser foot, made a bobbin sit horizontally in a holder, and later installed a foot drive,” Yuri clarified.   
In the middle of the 19th century, an experienced seamstress could only sew 40 stitches per minute, while Singer produced 900 stitches. Sewing machines used to be custom-made, therefore ordinary people could not afford such a luxury. It was difficult even to repair them, since there were no spare parts. Isaac Singer introduced conveyor assembly, used standardisation and unification methods. Consequently, it became possible to repair sewing machines in any workshop. “This is the story behind the creation of the device that, if lubricated, will work for hundreds of years. The main thing is that sewing machines became cheaper. From that moment on, women were able to sew at home for the needs of their families, and even earn money by completing orders,” Yuri Sergeyev underlined.  

Sewing machines from Yuri Sergeyev's collection
Yuri Sergeyev's collection of sewing machines

To the point

Yuri Sergeyev recalled that, as a student, he harnessed a children’s sewing machine to make fashionable things for himself, like pipestem trousers, as well as take in shirts, “I have a Japanese sewing machine at home with all the accessories. I sometimes use it. If there is a ready-made sewing pattern, I can easily sew it. What am I going to do with the collection? I would consider proposals for the creation of a permanent museum exhibition. It should be established. Especially in Vitebsk, where there are so many clothing manufacturers and educational establishments related to sewing industry!” 

By Yelena Alimova

Photos by Anton Stepanishchev