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Sewing - 11th March 2022

Many young people have a new hobby. They're making their own clothes. They're worried about the planet.

Lea Baecker's a student. She wants good clothes, not fast fashion.

Lea Baecker: "My main motivation was not having to buy ready-to-wear clothes anymore because I didn't want to support fast fashion. And also just to fit it better to my body. Yeah, and from then on, I never looked back."

Lea shares her clothes on Instagram. Her followers like her designs.

Rosie Scott sells unused material. Instagram helped her business. Sewing is now popular.

Rosie Scott: "Yeah, I think Instagram definitely helped make sewing look more cool. Like you saw a huge range of people on Instagram sewing. And, yeah, it was just like, more visible."

Rosie gets all her material from designers. Normally, designers throw unwanted material away. This habit's bad for the environment. So, many young people started sewing.

Rosie Scott: "The clients, well customers, have changed – they've become younger, definitely. More younger people are getting interested in sewing. And especially with the fabric, we find that, like, we get a lot of fashion students and young people who are really interested in learning how to make their own clothes and make them sustainably."

Many sewers use clothes patterns. These make sewing easier. Tara Viggo designs clothes patterns.

Tara Viggo: "It used to have quite a old-fashioned kind of point of view, but more people are realising how accessible it can be, actually. And it's, it's kind of fun, you know, and they're really getting into it."

Sewing helps the environment. People stop buying fast fashion. And sewers understand the process of making clothes. They know how much clothes cost.

Tara Viggo: "Letting people know how much involvement goes into making a garment is a really good way to make you aware. Once you know how to sew your own clothes, you can't fathom that a shirt should be £3 anymore."