To unlock the pocket from my son's school blazer...

[MuckyMare]

School blazers are £35 each. I have 2 son's.
Money is so tight right now.

I've just seen that Asda do navy blazers.

I'm thinking of in picking the pockets from their old blazers and sewing them onto asda ones

Total cost £20 for 2 rather than £70

Do you think the school will object?

Title should say unpick. Not unlock

Or John Lewis have them for £17 each, probably better quality but still a good saving.

i would do it, but take the pocket in with you and make sure it looks right

I would certainly do it.

I would not have thought they would object as long as the colour is a very good match

And you could also transfer the buttons from the “proper”blazers and transfer them to the Asda blazers to make them look more like the actual thing

My sister did this with my niece five years ago as blazers were compulsory for 6th years.
£20 from Asda instead of £80 she couldn't afford, didn't hear a thing from the school about it. Definitely do it!

Ah great idea scatty.

Ueah I'll take the pocket with me to check the colour match.
Just this way they might be able to get a 2nd blazer half way through the year. They grow so quickly and DS looks daft in his right now but I'm not forking out for a new one with weeks left at 35 quid.

That is SUCH a good idea!!! As long as the colour was a good match I would deffo do it. Also, have you tried searching Facebook marketplace for old uniform? Or maybe set up a Facebook sleeping page for your school's uniform?

*selling

Your kids will feel uncomfortable if they feel different to the other kids. I'd only do it if it's an absolute perfect replica, otherwise it could be a costly money saving exercise. Remember other kids are cruel and it could make them targets for unkind comments or even bullying.

My dss' secondary school sold individual sew on badges for about £3. One badge lasted right through to sixth form and any plain black blazer was acceptable.
Very sensible.

I’m pretty sure school aren’t allowed to specify branded uniform anyway.

So do it if your son would feel self conscious about it but otherwise I’d just go with the Asda one and forget the swapping.

@MuckyMare What about seeing if school have one in lost property they could loan to you for the last few weeks of term?

I’ve known loads of people do this. At first I thought your son had some fancy lockable diary with additional locked pockets for extra security!

Does it have the same pockets and collar and everything? Second hand might be wiser.

If you can make it look exactly like the official one then absolutely do it.

I think it's heinous that a compulsory item of uniform should be so expensive though (unless you are in a private school in which case it's sort of to be expected)

My secondary school had a compulsory cut and colour of blazer (navy blue double breasted) but the badges could be bought separately and sewn on. They were a couple of quid.

So some people had very expensive blazers and some had inexpensive ones but they all looked basically the same (at least at the start of the year before the wear and tear became more apparent)

My mum did this for my school blazer... but on my request because I wanted to look slightly different and for them to be able to say nothing about it!
So id ask your son if he minds... its a good idea but not if he would be embarrassed by it

I used to do this with school shirts as school ones were £16 so took the pocket from school shirt and sewed it on to cheap shirt could only do this with boys,girls didn't have a pocket

I wanted to do this but DS's is embroidered directly onto the fabric not a pocket. If I had a decent machine I would still be tempted.

DS1's school blazer had a seperate sew on badge so you could put it on any blazer

As long as its states on school uniform rules a blazer with logo, and not a school bought blazer with logo, then I'm sure you will be fine and the school can't really say anything. Good idea too, don't think I would've thought of that.

Our school uniform shop sells spare badges, you can tell they are different as the uniform shop blazers have them embroidered on - and they are not listed in the shop, you have to ask and they sigh and get them from under the counter the back of the store room but it's £35 for a blazer from there or tops £15 anywhere else.

I did that with my daughter's school jsweatshirt. The quality of the school stuff was dreadful so I bought plain ones carefully cut the crest off of the old ones and sewed them onto the new ones. You couldn't tell it wasn't the original.

My sons wouldn't care. They don't even ask for branded trainers or clothes.

They aren't materialistic at all.

wish i had known that could have been done...
im in NZ and my daughters uniform was a $300 nzd blazer a $280nzd kilt and a $90nzd jersey ( plus shirts and sports uniform and then a summer uniform too) and once in the last 2 years of school ( yr 12 and yr13) those 3 items were compulsory... oh and over the knee socks in black, not tights or pantyhose... over the knee socks, in black!

I was so excited about locked pockets............