Specialised Covers
Design & Manufacturing (Homeware, Interiors & Outdoor Products)
Specialised Covers is a family business established in 1981 from the love of tailored fashion and sports cars. We aspire to be the Saville Row suits of the vehicle world using the same techniques to generate form fitting cloth patterns for our customers as if it was a suit for them. Creating both aesthetically pleasing and protective products is our core object, to protect and preserve. The business has developed over the years to cover not just cars but caravans, aircraft, boats whatever the customer requires protecting. Once we have the pattern, we can generate the customers cover to fulfil the desired brief using our technical fabrics, production team and facilities based in Yorkshire.
We would also love to support the training and growth of the sewing industry and can support with experience and training in house for students. There will be a huge skills gap in the coming years if we do not start to recruit and train people to sew. There is currently no machine that can replace a skilled sewing machinist. We also have many connections with the automotive industry working for McLaren, Bentley, VW group and Lamborghini. These manufactures also rely heavily on the textile industry for their vehicle interiors and support when manufacturing the cars. In the future we hope to be able to support them further with technology and skills gained form our piers in this sector.
- Listing ID: 1487
- Contact: Katie Fishwick
- What are your aspirations and plans for the future?: Our future aspirations are to move more to the factory 4.0 of connected manufacturing, marrying our tailoring, design and production capabilities with a more digital approach. We are currently in essence a traditional clothing manufacturer, creating cloth patterns and producing cloth garments for vehicles. We would like to develop both our technical materials and our 3D CAD abilities to allow us to design from models supplied by vehicle manufactures. We also want to look at more sustainable materials and working practices, in particular the volume of waste we produce and what other items we can either manufacture from it or increase the amount we can recycle. Advanced technical fabrics is also an area we would like to develop further so we can offer these to our customers.
- What types of projects are you interested in working on through Future Fashion Factory?: All of them, I feel elements of each will help support our overall growth and development. The introduction of digital process and analysis is an area we are currently lacking in knowledge, and how best to implement it so it has a positive impact on the business. Offering customers increased customisable options is also what we need to elevate our customer offering. Having a unique tailored cover from any material and personalised is what our future customers will expect, and all within a very short lead time. Supporting the skills gap is also important to us so contributing to education programme would be a huge privilege.
