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Behind the brick walls of the Walt Whitman Houses in Fort Green, Brooklyn, is a seasoned seamstress who has sewn for the community for 27 years. Originally from Charleston, South Carolina, Jammer Welch moved to Brooklyn in 1965. If she’s seen it, she can sew it, and she says, she has sewn it all: from men’s suits and choir robes, to intricate wedding dresses. She even sews most of her own clothes.
Welch’s mother taught her how to stitch by hand as a child. But what started as a hobby became her livelihood when Welch started her own business in 1984. She ran the business out of the living room of her three-bedroom apartment in the Whitman Houses.
“I had five factory machines, I had four people working for me. Then I downsized, just me and one girl who used to sew together,” Welch says. By 2009, she was sewing by herself in her home. Welch says was happy to downsize – she was glad to have her living room back for entertaining company.
Welch’s business grew through word of mouth. She is known in the community as having made wedding dresses for almost every bride in the Whitman Houses. Welch says wedding dresses are difficult because they are time consuming – she sews on each pearl individually. Even though she says fabric has gotten more expensive over the years, she keeps her fees affordable. She charges $250 for men’s suits, $100 for choir robes and $200-500 for wedding dresses, depending on the intricacy of the design and the type of fabric used. Welch says prices for beaded fabric, which is often used for wedding dresses, has gotten expensive over the years – up to $100 per yard. But her prices haven’t changed.
“My daughter says I sew myself cheap. But I said, ‘look, I get everything back.’ Because I don’t like to be too expensive to people,” Welch said. When she sees other women in the wedding dresses she made, Welch says it brings her a sense of self-worth. “It’s my pride, you know. That’s God’s gift to me. If I see anything I can sew it. It’s a gift to me.”
Welch hopes to open a booth at Albee Square in downtown Brooklyn, where she plans to sew more than just wedding dresses. She has recently started working on menswear, dresses and even hats.
