Sewing and the Reformation of Prisoners
Elizabeth Fry was born in 1780 and, as a Quaker, she worked to improve the lives of the poor, sick and imprisoned. In 1813, Fry visited Newgate Prison, London where she was astonished by the appalling conditions that the women and children were being held in. The women’s section was overcrowded and dirty. They lived in small cells where they slept on straw and did their own cooking and washing. She began to work to reform prisons and pushed for legislation to make the treatment of prisoners more humane. In 1817, Fry founded the British Ladies’ Society for Promoting the Reformation of Female Prisoners. She campaigned for segregation of the sexes, female matrons for the female prisoners, religious worship, education and employment. She introduced items into the prison for the women to sew and knit, to give the prisoners a purpose. She favoured patchwork as it meant the prisoners could sew in small, confined spaces and it was repetitive to settle their minds. Patchwork also grows over time which allowed prisoners, who often came from backgrounds of poverty, to experience growth. Sewing not only gave prisoners something to do in prison, but gave them skills to use in future employment once they had been released. Elizabeth Fry is known as the “angel of prisons” for everything she did for prison reform. She died in 1845 but her work and ethics have continued in many prisons today.
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| Elizabeth Fry 1780-1845 |
Fry’s ideas have
spread into other prisons across the globe. Norway has one of the most humane
prison systems in the world. The emphasis is on “rehabilitation not recidivism”
(the tendency to re-offend). Halden Prison is one of Norway's most exemplary prisons, here prisoners only lose their liberty when they
enter the prison, they can still vote and have access to healthcare and
education. Whilst behind bars, prisoners can learn to cook, garden and they
take vocational classes. This helps offenders prepare for the outside world.
Norway also supports prisoners after release by helping them to find housing,
jobs and healthcare. One of the options open to the prisoners is sewing. A BBC
news article entitled “How Norway turns criminals into good neighbours”
describes how the prisoners were sewing toys in the workshop.
Historically, prisoners in the U.K. have sewn mail bags but many people criticised the scheme as unhelpful and doing nothing for the reformation of the prisoners. In 1997, Lady Anne Tree wished to change this, so, she founded the charity Fine Cell Work. Fine Cell Work is a “charity and social enterprise which enables prisoners to build fulfilling and crime-free lives.” The charity teaches stitching to predominantly male prisoners and allows them to receive payment for the work they do. Fine Cell Work has the largest workforce of hand stitchers in Europe with 500 prisoners being trained each year in over 30 prisons across the U.K. The aim of the programme is to improve the prisoner’s mental health, boost self-worth, instil self-discipline and gain skills to use in future employment so that the prisoner is less likely to re-offend in the future. The prisoners receive sewing kits with a set of instructions that are put together by some of the charity’s volunteers. Over 5,000 kits are made each year. Each kit is designed at different skill levels for the prisoners and they complete the product in their cells where they can be held in confinement for up to 23 hours a day. The products include cushions, pencil cases, lavender bags and much more. The charity has collaborated with designers such as Cressida Bell, Cath Kidston and Kit Kemp. Fine Cell Work reports that each product can take up to 150 hours of work. Volunteers visit fortnightly to teach and support the stitchers. Fine Cell Work provides the only paid work for prisoners. Prisoners can earn up to £1,500 a year and can gain a pay bonus for pieces of work completed to a high standard. The pieces are completed with a Fine Cell Work label with the stitchers name and customers are encouraged to write a thank you letter to them which gives prisoners a feeling of connection to the outside world. The products are sold online, in pop-up shops and at events across the county. The charity also supports prisoners once they are released through their “Open the Gate” programme which supports prisoners reintegration into society. This scheme provides volunteering opportunities, a chance to complete Fine Cell Work training programmes and an employment mentor to support apprentices into paid work.
In 2015 an English instillation artist, Cornelia Parker, created “Magna Carta (An Embroidery).” The embroidery depicts the 2014 Wikipedia article on the Magna Carta to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the document. Parker sought to collaborate with people and groups that had been impacted by the Magna Carta such as MPs, lawyers and prisoners. 36 prisoners, who participated in the Fine Cell Work programme, made a large contribution to the instillation.
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| "Magna Carta (An Embroidery)" was created in 2015 with the help of 36 prisoners. |
Recently, during the Coronavirus pandemic, prisoners from 8 category B and C prisons across the U.K. were tasked with making PPE. They made scrubs, visors and drawstring bags. At the end of April, the Daily Mail reported that an order had been placed in prisons for 5,000 tops and 5,000 drawstring bags.
Ex-offenders in
Blackburn, Lancashire also sewed PPE during the pandemic. The sewing circle is
run by a charity for former prisoners at Haworth House (a hostel run by the
probation service in Blackburn) and has been sewing face masks with fabric donated
by Great British Sewing Bee judge, Patrick Grant.
Since Elizabeth
Fry introduced sewing into prisons, reformation has evolved and changed. Sewing
as a form of reformation has been embraced in many prisons across the U.K. to
boost prisoner’s mental health and self-discipline. It is hoped that through sewing, schemes such as Fine Cell Work, will improve the lives of prisoners and result in a drop in the rate of re-offending.
Fine Cell Work - https://finecellwork.co.uk/
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