Why I'm Creating The Cloth Cutter

Flying off the Hamster Wheel in spectacular fashion - is how a very good friend described the events that have led me to creating The Cloth Cutter.

The Cloth Cutter is a new venture for me and not the first business I have run. Previously my chief occupation was Sew Me Something, a venture I ran for just over 12 years. Starting from a small shop in the heart of Stratford upon Avon with just 15 rolls of fabric and a workshop space. 

I had fallen out of love with the politics of teaching, having been a fashion lecturer for nearly 6 years. And when a friend described the concept of a Sewing Cafe I knew I had to give it a go. The shop continued for 6 years until the lease ran out and I moved the business out of the town centre into converted farm barns just to the south of Stratford. 

Literally 18 months later we were in lockdown and I had to be the most creative I had ever been business-wise to survive. The pandemic showed the importance of creativity and how it can make us all the better for it. And with a lot of hard work the business came out of it stronger than when we went in. 

And this is where it started to go wrong. 

With the growth in business came longer working hours and I was properly back on the hamster wheel. During lockdown I wasn't working weekends as there were no workshops to teach. But back in the real world, weekends were when people had free time and wanted to use it. So I looked for new tutors and found some really good ones to help take on some of the teaching so I could work on new patterns. But in order to pay them we needed more people in those workshops which meant more marketing and advertising. 

Now there are only so many hours in the day so I needed more people to help me create the patterns and to market the workshops. And so you can see how the business grew. 

Hindsight is 20:20 and looking back I just hadn't got the mix right. So when an amazing opportunity came along to create something fabulous even though we went for it, the foundations were too rocky for it to last. 

I can say this now with three months of rest, reflection, and perspective under my belt. But the simple fact is that we grew too big, too quick and I didn’t have the right people and processes in place to make it work. I am certainly not laying the blame for anything at anyone else’s feet other than my own. But businesses fail due to many complex reasons, in this case some were my fault but many weren’t. However, I was the Managing Director and major shareholder so the buck stopped with me. 

Those that came to visit us at Longbarn Village all agree that we had created something wonderful. We had our core Sew Me Something haberdashery and patterns, sewing workshops, craft workshops, co-working space, cafe and events. Not to mention the other businesses that rented space from us. Our aim was to build a creative hub, a destination for people to indulge in their own creativity, learn from others and share knowledge and experiences. 

And we did just that  - for about a year.

Then sadly the stress and overwhelm caught up with me. Not having the right foundations in place meant decisions were not being made in the right way at the right time. More and more was falling onto my plate as ‘The Boss’ and I had no second in command to rely on. We were just not making enough money to cover our debts and it came to a point in early August 2024 when I could no longer cope and I lost control. 

When the company finally went into the hands of the liquidators I literally took my hands off the wheel. We closed the doors and made everyone redundant at the end of August and  I have never felt so completely and utterly wretched in my entire life. 

Putting a business into liquidation is a very lonely and discombobulating experience. So many people want to know what’s happening. When are they getting paid, what’s happening about workshops, orders, retreats. . . the list goes on. And the weird thing is that you don't know. Literally, I had no clue what was happening. Trying to get straight answers to questions I had from the liquidators was nigh on impossible. 

And then there is the blame - heaped on you by the people who want to know what’s going on. As human beings, if there are gaps in knowledge or information, we try to create our own narrative to make sense of it all in place of that missing information. So it was much easier to paint me as the bad guy and I totally understand this. Unfortunately, there was no way of contradicting this. 

Then there was the blame I heaped upon myself causing me to descend into some kind of fugue for a while. I felt totally responsible and completely worthless. So I withdrew. Literally and into myself, I didn’t leave the house unless it was to walk Olive. Now after some time away from all this I know I was suffering from Burn Out. While not a specific mental health condition it is recognised by the World Heath Organisation as an ‘occupational phenomenon’ and is defined as such - 

“Burnout is a state of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion. It can occur when you experience long-term stress and feel under constant pressure.”

Which is a place I have been hanging out in for quite some time. I have found the Mental Health UK website has some really useful information on burnout. Along with other websites I have learned much more about this state of being and have realised I have been suffering with many of the symptoms for a number of years. 

I had always thought of myself as a capable person, strong and in control. Able to deal with what life throws at me. After all I had been through a divorce, life as a single parent, running other businesses, but all this just meant I had just been building up a store of stress and finally it was just too much to deal with. 

I have been incredibly lucky in having so many supportive people around me. While there have been the haters, and quite frankly a hater's gonna hate no matter what you say. So let them get on with it. The people closest to me have been amazing in their unerring support and belief in me. 

All my major fabric and haberdashery suppliers have continued to support me through this, they just get it. In fact anyone I have spoken to about this situation who also runs a business - gets it. I have certainly found out who I can call ‘friend’ and who I thought were friends but turned out not to be. 

Having time out from running a business and dealing with all that that entails has been healing and given me space to rest, reflect, think, learn and gain more insight about what has happened and also insight into myself and how I operate as a person. 

There are more lessons to be learnt and different ways of being and working that I still need to understand and develop. I am a work in progress. But slowly starting up The Cloth Cutter is a good way for me to put into practise what I am learning and to experiment with new and different ways of creating a working life. 

So please bear with me while I stumble forwards, pick myself up and lean on those around me to navigate my way back to doing what I love.  

Jules x