About

Seam haberdashery is a small shop situated in the beautiful small town of Topsham, nr Exeter in East Devon, about 4 miles from Exeter which sells a mixture of new and vintage fabrics, yarns, trimmings and lace as well as sewing and knitting kits, buttons and buckles.

Our knitwear is all carefully made by hand in Devon. You can either buy items for your own projects or a selection of hand made products for gifts or yourself.

My name is Michelle, and I obtained a degree in Fashion Design from Ravensbourne College of Art in 1990. From an early age I loved to draw and my love of drawing continues to this day. My interest in surface pattern, knit and embroidery developed while I taught fashion and textiles. Working with my students, I started to gain many different processes, mixing fashion with fine art but I wouldn’t necessarily describe myself as an artist. I love to make and over the years, I have learnt that making is essential to my wellbeing and completely absorbs me.

My love of historical fabric and in particular, the tactile nature of fabric and trimmings, grew by teaching alongside a colleague who studied embroidery at Degree level. Her love of history informed both mine and our students' imaginations and so I started to collect and look back at the past to inspire all my work.

Like a magpie I collected and became obsessed with beautiful cloth, lace, yarns and trimmings. I like to think that our obsessive attention to detail and research methods were passed on to our students informing them about how things were put together in the past and how they could possibly be put together in the future. I also wanted all my students to think about sustainability within fashion and textiles and how the past can also inform and exists for tomorrow.