Introducing SFW Hub: Hastings
Next up in our introductory blog series on our fantastic Hubs for 2025 we have a Hastings! Formed by the delightful duo of Vanessa of the Unzipped Sewing Cafe and Suzan from MAKU.
Can you tell us a little bit about yourselves?
Suzan & Vanessa: “MAKU UK founder Suzan Aral and Ness Newman (aka the Cycling Seamstress) first hosted a SFW hub in 2024. Their collaboration covered workshops, pop-ups and a panel discussion – held at the DEPO, Hastings – as well as their first fashion show at the SFW Brighton launch.
This year they are collaborating again, hosting events across two venues – the DEPO and Unzipped Sewing Café.
Unzipped is Ness’ new venue in neighbouring St Leonards. A beautiful space for sustainable making right on the seafront, it hosts sewing classes and events as well as offering visitors delicious coffee.
MAKU’s aim from the start has been to 'make use not waste' and encourage others to do the same. Their Hastings HQ, aka the DEPO, is not only a workspace, but also a venue where others interested in wasting less can run events or host exhibitions. To date the DEPO has hosted pop-up sales, sewing groups, art classes and exhibitions – all with sustainability at their core.”
About Ness Newman
Former window dresser at Harvey Nichols, Versace, Ferré. Artist, sustainable fashion designer-maker, sewing teacher. In love with producing own micro-collection of sustainable clothing using only preloved/deadstock/vintage/antique fabrics, and visible mending in St Leonards.
About Suzan Aral
A graphic designer by profession, Suzan has always seen the potential in ‘waste’ materials. From an early age she loved to make – using paper, fabric, clay or whatever else she could get her hands on. Always an advocate for ‘making use’ rather than waste, Suzan founded MAKU UK in 2021 and is passionate about encouraging sustainable approaches to what we wear.
About MAKU
MAKÜ UK is a business based on making use of mass production discards, so we feel it’s vital to talk about how fashion can be sustainable and the positive change we can all make through our own clothing choices. By bringing people together via mending and making events and our panel discussion on 'Sustainability Tribes', we hope to inspire more sustainable ways of sourcing and maintaining our wardrobes.
How can we affect positive change in the fashion industry?
Ness: “A good place to start would be to stop buying from chains stores who mass produce… consider what you have already in your wardrobe before you buy something new – there are many ways to rethink a garment. Avoid those made using synthetic fabrics as natural fibres are better for us and our environment.”
Suzan: “My approach is to shop second hand for garments I need and only consider buying new if I’m not unable to find what I’m after. We should remember that a cheap price tag may be appealing – but someone, somewhere is paying for the true cost of that new garment.”
Visit the MAKU website here. Learn more about The Unzipped Sewing Cafe here.
Take a look at their previous activities as part of SFW in our previous programmes here.