The Blancot project by Catherine Davies in collaboration with Oasis Cardiff. Film by Tom Cronin

so uh the blancop project is a project we're um making coats out of old vintage welsh blankets old cat fen we're making oversized coats out of out after these beautiful blankets that have kind of maybe well they've been donated for the project so uh lots of people have donated blankets that they've found in in the attic and some of them have got holes and tears but that's not a problem so because i cut out the patterns and avoiding the holes and the tiers and the marks and yeah so it's a sustainably sourced material which is very important to me also the pocketing fabric the lining fabric and the under collar felt for the jackets are all sourced from the recreate scrap store in cardiff so it's an environmentally conscious project it's also a social project sharing my my skills as a tailor and upskilling people here at the oasis center on wednesday afternoon on a thursday i run a workshop where i'm teaching these tailoring skills and we're making these blankets together so there's a combination of hand sewing and machine sewing so traditional tailoring techniques and industrial tailoring techniques combined uh yeah so the the caravan blankets um czech and plaid those are the ones that i've been collecting beautifully beautiful patterns beautiful colors and they kind of suit this oversized coat style so i've cut cut a pattern so with lapel and collar and yeah so i'm really pleased with the way things are going what first made me want to become a tailor um i think i just love making pockets i i sort of love making all types of different pockets and i love the the hand sewing element um the you know sort of the details that you don't actually see all the sort of hidden details inside the construction of a coat or a jacket has always fascinated me so yeah i love i love that about tailoring and that it's just such an old craft um that kind of links in a little bit with my uh interest in the welsh woolen industry and um sort of revisiting discovering these beautiful blankets and the process behind making blankets from just sheep fleece is quite amazing really whales used to be full of um woolen mills and so now we've only got a few left my granddad was a sheep farmer so i suppose that's like an element as well um yeah so so lots of the blankets that we were using um [Music] they were made in the 30s or the 40s or the 50s and they still look well they just look beautiful quality what's inspired the project really is a desire to set up a sustainable fashion social enterprise project um where i can share my skills so i can teach but also fundamentally kind of use my skills as a tailor to make coats the project is funded um by the laura ashley foundation so we had a sort of a grant from the laura ashley foundation and also from the viridor project quiv fund so the viridor fund supports community projects that are linked to recycling materials like waste materials so yeah the the fact that we're using like the the different elements like i like the fact that we're using old um snooker table felt for the ender collar and uh end of roll fabrics um salvage fabrics from the recreate scrap store for the lining and for the pocketing hoping to make a collection of coats to sell and then we're also going to be selling a smaller smaller items that we're making with the the waste so it's a zero waste project so all of the scraps after cutting out the blankets cutting out the coat patterns all of the scraps then are used to make lavender hearts or draft excluders and and um hot water bottle covers as well mini hot water bottle covers yeah excited