Thank you, commissioning lords, for sending us in our time of need series six (I know – six! Didn’t time fly when we used to have fun?) of The Great British Sewing Bee (BBC One) to distract us from The Great British Balls-Up, The Great British Death Count and The Great British Wasteland of Competence, Political Communication, Professional Responsibility and Crisis Management Expertise.
It’s back. Twelve amateur sewers instead of bakers, wowing us with creations made of fabric rather than dough and pastry but still with the same sweet, spirit-lifting powers inherent in the sight of anything beautiful and useful springing to life under the human hand, where none was there before. It even has its own line in puns too, though they tend to centre round unfortunate puckerings and dotted plackets instead of soggy bottoms and nice buns.
Also, there’s Patrick Grant. The effortlessly charming designer and director of the Savile Row tailors Norton & Sons is the only one of the original presenting lineup who remains. He is there to appraise the contestants’ work, but his bladed elegance is a silent judgment on us all; a wordless yet constant reminder of the heights we should always strive to reach even as, mere capering, hairless monkeys before him that we are, we will never reach beyond the foothills. A friend of mine once noted that she kept trying to undress Grant in her mind’s eye, but “it’s just better and better suits all the way down”. Take that, Paul Hollywood with your vulgar handshakes, a man who always looks like he’s dressed in double denim even if he’s not.
Fellow judge Esme Young, costume designer for most of the films in which you have adored the costumes and a lecturer at Central Saint Martin’s, is back with her trademark silver bob, glamorous bohemianism and astute veteran’s eye. Joe Lycett is the congenial host and with very little further ado we are off. Three sewing challenges per show, showcasing different skills and – hopefully – allowing everyone a chance to shine somewhere and the viewer to sit at home for a brief but golden hour in which all that matters is a dozen wrap skirts, repurposed shirts (“My father is at home barechested,” says Lycett, “and very confused”) and whether tea dresses hit appropriately below the knee.
Like Bake Off, like Kirstie Allsopp’s arts and crafts curations and like the ne plus ultra of restorative programming The Repair Shop (we must talk about this properly sometime, but short version – it repairs your soul), it provides respite and retreat by showing people working hard and taking something seriously that doesn’t matter more than it should.
None of the participants is cast in order to raise any hackles or provide grit in the oyster. Everything is designed to shine a little light, to show you what can be done by ordinary people with a special set of skills. Hazel is a charity worker who got into sewing when feeling lost after the birth of her first child. Peter is a hostel manager from Brighton who turns out to be able to channel Vivienne Westwood through the medium of men’s officewear (he wins the repurposed shirts challenge comfortably and the wrap skirt round thanks to his sharp rouleau loop work and top notch topstitching). And Matt’s sideline in making bespoke costumes for his drag queen friends puts him in pole position when it comes to designing a tea dress around a model in five hours flat.
The rest of them are smashing too, though I cannot help but feel a little extra fondness for Claire. Who cannot love a vintage clothes enthusiast with her hair in a victory roll, first seen cycling in tweed on a sit-up-and-beg bike through her native Winchester, who says “Blast!” when she drops her scissors and refers to a recalcitrant zip as “a beast”? Commitment is everything.
Disasters (mismatched buttons! Pricked fingers and bloodied fabric!) and triumphs (successful rouleau reversals! Perfect pleats!) arise in plentiful but never overwhelming or unfair measure.
My preview did not show the winner or loser of the first round. I suspect the former must have been Peter but I’m hoping they just let everyone else stay. No losers during lockdown should be every programme maker’s motto. Just edit them back in like they did the late Oliver Reed in Gladiator and continue to add to whatever gaiety the nation can still muster. You know it makes sense.
