Keepsake Bear Fabric

Posted on March 24, 2015 By Blazer Bear

Keepsake Bear Fabric

New for 2015 – we now offer a fabric sourcing service

We were really excited a few weeks ago to visit wonderful British weavers in Otley Leeds, which is in the heart of Yorkshire. The reason for our trip is to discuss the possibility of sourcing uniform, kilt and other fabric directly for our keepsake bears.

Many people like to use their very own clothing for the Blazer Bear. However we have often been asked if we are able to supple the material. This may be because they are making a bear before their children have left school to add the badges and colours to or simply due to needing the clothing for younger siblings. It has also been something we have wanted to do as it allows us to create keepsake bears for leavers, which means the bears can be presented before the end of term.

Having hopped on the train at Kings Cross we were in Otley within 3 hours. We were given a very warm welcome and a hot cup of tea having come in from the snow! It was fantastic to talk to Francis the sales director and hear what a thriving British business they have. Four new looms had just been delivered to increase their productivity and help them cope with the increasing orders after a very successful few years.

They specialize in school wear, highland fabric, tweed, military and sports uniform. Perfect for us and the range was fantastic. We did not have time to view all the many many options available but we have already put in our first order! We have a school that has ordered large Blazer Bears for all their leavers. They wanted us to source their blazer fabric, which was a beautiful Venetian stripe. The extras such as ties and dresses we can also source so that the bears will be all completed before the end of term.

We then visited Leeds, which is a great city. So much going on and it appears also thriving. There seems a huge amount of development in and around the center and support for lots of smaller British run businesses. We had lunch at RARE which was a fantastic way to end our trip to Yorkshire. Delicious food and quirky décor!

We are finishing orders this week and next week for Easter including a very special Blazer Bear for a much loved Dad. It is made from a favourite suit and has a special message embroidered on the back.  Two other bears this week that will be completed have a little silver and a little gold heart inside which the customer requested. We thought this was so sweet!

So the workshop is a hive of activity and mini eggs at the moment. We are so pleased we can now help to source fabric for customers as it is always disappointing when in the past when asked and this service was not possible.. We can now feel confident that unless the uniform is specially designed we are able to source 80% of fabric! We also feel delighted that we are also supporting a fantastic British textile manufacturing company at the same time.