A Great British Baby Grow

If you are in the UK, you doubtless are already aware that the latest season of the Great British Sewing Bee is well underway! Not only have they got a new location (which looks uncannily like the old one in Wapping, but is now coincidentally located right by my office), but also a new judge, with Esme Young replacing May Martin as Patrick Grant’s wing-woman.

I wasn’t able to be as involved on the production side for this season as I was last time around due to my working four days a week at my office job, but I was able to help out with some sewn samples for the latest Sewing Bee book, instructions and illustrations, but also make the odd “Perfect” for the show, too!

Happy 2018! (My Year in Review)

Happy fresh and new baby year, everyone! I always like to celebrate the first of the year with a look back at the year that’s just completed – this gives me a chance to reflect at the things I’ve accomplished, the garments I’ve made, and challenges conquered. As is traditional, I find myself starting 2018 with lots of great stuff on the horizon but unable to talk about it (this time last year my two big secrets were my Threads article and my book deal, so you’d better believe 2018’s secret project is a good’un!) so you’ll just have to trust me that the outlook for 2018 is rosy indeed!

Burda magazine – October 2017

Wow, what a whirlwind few weekends I’ve had recently! I’ve barely cleaned up from the Great British Sewing Bee Live show and suddenly I found myself jetting off to northern Portgual to run up and down some mountains in the unseasonable heat! I’ve written up a full race review on my running site, but it may interest some of you to know I wore the cycling shorts pattern from my book for the race, too (minus the padding and silicone elastic hems, of course!).

It might also interest those of you in the southern hemisphere to know that there’s a new activewear fabric store in Australia – Sew Active Fabrics – and they’ve got a bunch of wicking prints, too. I’ve got a few of their fabrics to road-test over the next few weeks, but you can save 10% with code LAUNCH10 til the end of November if you want a sneak peek for your spring and summer activewear makes.

But enough about me – let’s look inside the latest issue of Burda magazine and see what delights await us!

The making of a Threads article

Thanks so much for all your congratulations on my activewear sewing article in the latest Threads magazine (issue 190). If you haven’t seen it yet, it should be on newsstands very soon – do go and buy it because (as usual!) there are a ton of really interesting articles included. Threads is a magazine I totally and fully respect, and I hold it in the highest esteem possible. When I started sewing, the information and techniques it included was something I was in total awe of, and even now, I learn something new from every single issue. It’s a magazine that doesn’t “dumb down” and is unashamedly not aimed at beginning sewists, which is refreshing in itself!

Happy 2017 (my year in review)

Woohoo! It’s a fresh new year! Each year I like to take the first of January to look back on what I’ve sewn in the previous year. So while this post is a celebration of the new year, it’s also a look back at what I’ve been up to in the last twelve months, which I always find to be a helpful exercise!

Burda magazine December 2016

I know it’s a cliché, but my god, where did the year go? I mean, I know I basically lost the first three months of the year but still. Overall, it’s been a fantastic year of Burda magazines, in my opinion, and I’m pleased to report that there’s no letup for the final issue of 2016. I’ve ended up picking a lot out of this one so grab a mug of something hot and settle on in…