The Great British Sewing Bee is currently delighting BBC viewers – but what do we know about judge Esme Young’s life?
Esme Young is an esteemed British fashion designer(Image: BBC)
The Great British Sewing Bee judge Esme Young has faced her fair share of struggles.
In 2016, Esme replaced May Martin as a judge on the hit BBC competition. She has since delighted BBC viewers alongside Patrick Grant and a number of hosts, including Joe Lycett, Sara Pascoe and Sophie Willan.
Over the years, Esme has established herself as an esteemed British fashion designer. In 1972, she founded a shop in Camden Town called Swanky Modes, alongside fellow designers Judy Dewsbury, Melanie Herberfield and Willie Walters.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Swanky Mode’s clothing appeared in Vogue, Honey and The Face, and was photographed by David Bailey, Nick Knight, and John Swannell.
Since then, Esme has made costumes for many films, including The Beach, Bridget Jones’s Diary, Romeo and Juliet, and Trainspotting. She notably designed the bunny costume worn by Renée Zellweger in the first Bridget Jones movie.
That’s not all, as one of Esme’s most famous designs was the Amorphous Dress worn by Linda Kozlowski in the 1986 movie Crocodile Dundee – a dress that is now in the V&A Collection.
But away from her successful career, Esme has also been through a number of challenges.
Personal struggles
Esme grew up in Bedford with her stay-at-home mum and her dad, who was an RAF pilot. He was a fighter pilot in World War Two.
Speaking with The Telegraph in 2022, Esme opened up about her life in north London, after moving into a one-bedroom flat in 1983.
“I’ve never been able to afford my own home. I’ve lived in social housing since 1983 – in a one-bedroom flat in Islington, north London, rented from the charitable housing trust Peabody,” she explained.
Reflecting on her previous money struggles, Esme told This is Money: “I could not afford to pay rent so I lived in a squat with my brother and friends… We had to pay for our electricity via a meter but otherwise we lived rent-free.”
The designer has previously shared her support for the Macmillan cancer charity, after her mum died of cancer.
“Even though I do not have much money, I give as much as I can to Macmillan Cancer Support. My mother died of cancer and it gave her and all the family lots of support,” she shared.
Hidden condition
In an interview with SheerLuxe, Esme revealed that she was “partially deaf” and therefore only learned to read when she was seven years old.
“My teachers thought I was thick and my father used to describe me as ‘dreamy’ – but, really, I was in my own little world because I couldn’t hear anyone,” she explained.
“I also didn’t learn to read until I was seven because I didn’t know how to make the right sounds. It’s still a bit of a problem today because I have to look at everything visually.”
The Great British Sewing Bee is available to stream on BBC iPlayer