One of Wales’s leading bespoke tailors will be sharing her exemplary skills with local garment-makers, through the medium of Welsh.

Catherine Davies – otherwise known as ‘Y Teilwr Bach’ (the little tailor) - swaps her spectacular theatre costumes for weekly conversational Welsh classes in Hermon, north Pembrokeshire.

The Welsh Sewing Circle (Cylch Gwynio Cymraeg) will take place at Y Stiwdio, and will offer people the chance to work with textiles alongside the internationally-acclaimed tailor, whilst practising their conversational Welsh. 

“People can bring their own sewing or, if they prefer, I can give them ideas on how to re-purpose old fabrics,” she said.

“And throughout the each session, the sewers will be using the Welsh language.

"This is such a successful way of learning a language because when people are given the chance to use it in a practical situation like this, it becomes so much more natural.”

Catherine, who is herself a fluent Welsh, English, Swedish, Spanish and Catalan speaker, is hopeful that her sessions will attract a cross-section of both learners and fluent Welsh speakers.

Now residing in Login, north Pembrokeshire, Catherine’s career, both as a theatrical and a bespoke tailor, is considerable.

Her tailoring began in Vasa, Finland where she studied industrial tailoring and dressmaking in a Swedish-medium vocational college.

She went on to achieve a masters in costume design for theatre, opera and cinema at the IED Design School in Barcelona.

Her career has led her to some of the finest theatre costume and tailoring departments including at Glyndebourne and the Tallinn Opera.

Catherine went on to develop her traditional tailoring skills in the bespoke men’s tailoring workroom within the prestigious Santa Eulalia store in Barcelona.

Throughout her career, Catherine has remained passionate about using only traditional tailoring techniques and is also a keen advocate for sustainable fashion and the ‘slow fashion’ movement.

She now focuses solely on tailoring bespoke coats and jackets and earlier this year was asked to stage an exhibition at Melin Tregwynt, Fishguard, funded by the Welsh Arts Council.

The exhibition featured five bespoke coats that were inspired by the landscapes around Pembrokeshire; their linings were designed and screen-printed by hand using traditional tailoring techniques while the outer fabrics were all woven at the Tregwynt Mill.

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Catherine is constantly striving to recycle fabrics and source her materials ethically and locally, with the result that all garment ‘toiles’ are made from end-of-roll fabrics.

If anyone is interested in joining the Cylch Gwnio Cymraeg sessions at Hermon, they should contact the direct booking link on

Direct booking link HERE

For details on future courses and workshops at  Y Stiwdio, Hermon, they can visit the Stiwdio website HERE.