Sew Fabulous in Brighton

I live in Lewes on the edge of the downs with my teenage children, a 17 year old boy called Noah and a 13 year old girl called Elfie. I have always loved making things and being creative. I used to make my own clothes, making it up as I went along. Finding it frustrating that things fell apart and looked shocking on the inside I took myself off to college! My children were small and I worked in years provision and attended adult education college to learn dressmaking and pattern cutting. I then began to specialise in corsetry and set up as a freelance corset maker. I exhibited my collection and took commissions. I enjoyed the technical side to my work but felt isolated from the rest of the world. I began working with the wonderful Brighton based charity Gladrags Community Costume Resource as the Educational Workshops Coordinator, where I am still happily running projects with children and young people. I found I could combine my two areas of work seamlessly. Textiles/sewing and working with children. I am a qualified youth arts project manager and regularly freelance for other arts and cultural organisations including galleries and youth provision. Sew Fabulous was born in 2013 as a mobile celebratory workshop provider and established as a Community Interest Company in 2014. We have recently moved to our beautiful new studio in Brighton Open Market. We're looking forward to all the classes and workshops and to encouraging creativity!

I live in the beautiful village of Glynde with 2 of my children Hugo aged 15 and Ruby aged 9. I started sewing over 20 years ago when my first daughter Rachael was a baby, when I attended a dressmaking course at an Adult Learning Centre mainly to take advantage of the creche facilities! Despite my ulterior motive, I found that I really enjoyed the processes involved and the creativity it produced in me, and was soon experimenting, making clothes for my little girl and things for my home. I first used my skills in a professional capacity after I moved to Brighton in 2000 and set up a small business making soft furnishings. Since then I have diversified hugely and have gained many sewing 'strings to my bow' . I have worked on many jobs , from themed hotel soft furnishings, wedding dresses, and costume to working as a seamstress for an up and coming designer in the stressful run up to London Fashion Week! I recently decided to turn my hand to teaching after a friend asked me to show her a few things on the sewing machine. I set up a small class in the village where I live which ran for 2 years. I then opened a small teaching space in the town of Lewes and ran a variety of classes there too, including a very popular after school club for kids and teens. I am really looking forward to continuing these classes from the new Sew Fabulous Studio in the newly developed Brighton Open Market.