In The News

Sew Positive has appointed four new trustees, including a new chair.

CEO Melissa Santiago Val said: “We are delighted that Sarah McManus, Jane Webber, Alex Collis and Karin Read have all agreed to join our Board, with Sarah taking up the role of chair. All four bring unique skills and experience to strengthen the charity and help us to define and shape our future services.”

Sarah McManus

Sarah has over 25 years’ senior leadership experience across Health and Social Care, including as Hospital Director (East) for SpaMedica and Head of Implementation for Vita Health Groups NHS mental health services. She also led The Papworth Trust’s Care and Employment Services across the East of England. Sarah’s passion lies in supporting others to have better futures. Her background is in developing and executing strategies that deliver services with sustainable outcomes for participants.

Jane Webber

Jane is a former Sales and Marketing Director for several well-known technology companies in the UK and Europe. She retrained as a nutritionist in 2008 and now helps midlife women make informed decisions about their eating and lifestyle habits. Jane has held several volunteer positions over the years and is passionate about helping others.

Alex Collis

Alex has over 10 years’ experience of working in community development and setting up volunteer-led projects, particularly in the area of food justice. During COVID, she headed up delivery of the city’s emergency food provision. She was also a city councillor, heading up work on wellbeing, food justice and sustainable food, and open spaces. She works as a Humanist celebrant, leading non-religious funerals, weddings and naming ceremonies and is also a qualified pastoral carer, volunteering as a hospice chaplain.

Karin Read

Karin specialises in knowledge and engagement of the local voluntary and statutory sector, currently working at Care Network Cambridgeshire. She also has a background in costume design and believes in the positive power of sewing – this combined with her running hobby led her to raise funds for Sew Positive in the Manchester Marathon in 2021.

Image: New trustees – top  Sarah McManus (left) and Jane Webber; below Alex Collis (left) and Karin Read

Sew Positive still seeks a new treasurer. Read about the role and find out how to apply here.

A charity is helping share the wellbeing calm of creativity, one stitch at a time, thanks to grant funding support from South Cambridgeshire District Council.

Sew Positive is a small charity that hosts various classes and events bringing people together through sewing for positive mental health.

Their events have included a wellbeing creative day at Cambridge Central mosque, embroidery kit days at Shelford Library, and upcycling lampshades at the Hub in Cambourne by repurposing donated fabric.

Read the full article on the Cambridge Network here

A Ukrainian refugee was able to connect with the local community and join fellow refugees in learning new skills thanks to the efforts of Sew Positive, the Cambridge sewing charity, supported by The National Lottery.

Zhenya Nekrasova, 26, moved to Cambridgeshire in April 2022, away from her family and friends in Zaporizhzhya amid the ongoing conflict in her home country. Initially struggling with separation from her family and knowing no one in the local community, Nekrasova discovered Sew Positive after meeting charity founder Melissa Santiago-Val.

Read the full article in SW Londoner here

Whatever your thoughts on the fashion industry, clothes are crucial. Not only do they keep us warm and dry, but they help us express ourselves, conveying aspects of personality, taste and the cultures or trends that we
subscribe to.

The problem is, in recent years, consumption of clothing has gone through a dizzying increase; in the last two decades alone, the amount of clothes being bought around the world has doubled, with over 80 billion garments made every year. Each item of clothing uses a vast quantity of energy, raw materials, chemicals, labour and water in its production, making fast fashion a pressing environmental challenge faced by the planet.

Click here to read the full article.

Sew Positive, the Cambridge sewing and repair charity, has partnered with COEL to find ways of reusing and upcycling sample fabrics for use in office and workspace interiors.

The charity helps people to learn to make, repair, mend, upcycle and repurpose clothes. It also aims to build communities of like-minded people facing social exclusion, and those working with the charity have found how sewing can be calming, and improve mental health and wellbeing.

Now it has teamed up with Cambridge-based office fit-out and design specialist COEL to cut down textile waste, providing discontinued swatches and remnants from previous projects.

Click here to read the full article on Cambridge Independent.

Cambridge charities Sew Positive and Cambridge Women’s Resources Centre (CWRC) have been awarded £10,000 National Lottery funding to run a year-long programme of workshops and events to tackle climate change through fashion and textile recycling.

The programme includes teaching repairing and mending, upcycling and repurposing clothes. Workshops will range from using a sewing machine and making sustainable sanitary products to creative workshops on repurposing clothes and charity shop finds.

The first series of weekly two-hour afternoon courses starts on April 19 and lasts 12 weeks. Courses will be repeated in autumn and spring terms for new groups.

Click here to read the full article in Cambridge Independent.

Haslingfield is having a go at the Sew Positive Jubilee Community Bunting Challenge.

Click here to listen to the interview on the BBC.

Phoenix Trust, a charity supporting people with learning disabilities, participated in a workshop organised by Sew Positive to customise aprons for their new cake making business. Phoenix Trust’s association with Sew Positive started when they very kindly provided a wonderful array of masks towards the start of the pandemic.

Recently they came on site with their sewing machines, offering not just their time and expertise, but also materials. The Phoenix co-workers were delighted with their designs which have subsequently received many compliments! It was also a great opportunity to have a go at learning a new skill working on the sewing machine, cutting the fabric and using the iron to press pieces flat.

Click here to read the full article.

St Mary’s School alumna Melissa Santiago-Val is creating bunting for her former school, using old uniforms
that are now beyond repair. The bunting will act as a point of interest for special occasions at the school, as well as highlighting textile waste and encouraging support for the new charity.

Commenting on the project, Melissa said: “I’m delighted to be doing this for St Mary’s School and | hope that it will act as a talking point for discussion on textile waste, creativity and how activities, such as sewing, can help support positive mental health.”

Click here to read the full article on Velvet Magazine.

A new charity, Sew Positive, set up by alumna Melissa Santiago-Val (at school 1976-1986), is making a celebratory set of St Mary’s bunting by upcycling old school uniforms that are beyond repair, to highlight the issue of textile waste, promote wellbeing through sewing and encourage people to think of alternatives to textile waste.

The charity already raised £40k for NHS charities together, and has progressed from making face coverings to delivering workshops to vulnerable groups across Cambridge facing isolation and mental health issues, including a course for women at the Cambridge Women’s Resource Centre, aprons for the Phoenix Trust in Milton and uniforms for Turtle Dove social enterprise.

One of its’ volunteers, Joanna (pictured) has been cutting up the donated skirts ready to match to a blue background. Sparkling gold thread will be used to match the St Mary’s emblem, which will run in zig-zag stitch across the top of the bunting’s blue webbing.

Click here to read the full article.