Beatrice Uprichard and Ruth Farris - Fishbone and Sycamore

Beatrice Uprichard and Ruth Farris of Fishbone and Sycamore are the sole designers of heritage jacquard silk in the UK. They have spent three years restoring, weaving and perfecting lost skills at Paradise Mill in Macclesfield. This remarkable relic is known for its unique collection of Victorian jacquard handlooms - here time has stood still since the Industrial Revolution.

Silk weaving is on the Heritage Craft Association's red list of endangered crafts, and Fishbone and Sycamore is the result of Bea and Ruth’s resolve not only to preserve, but to breathe new life into the craft. They design and produce 100% silk scarves and neckerchiefs using deadstock silk, and only traditional processes, passed down through generations since Macclesfield’s global notoriety for silk began in the 1700s. Their designs are playful and joyful, rooted in tradition, and celebrate the marriage of technology and beauty in the Jacquard mechanism, whose binary system inspired the first computer.