A High Wycombe bridal seamstress company has turned its attention to producing hand-sewn face masks during the coronavirus pandemic.

The Secret Fitting Room, based in Queen Street in High Wycombe, has started to make fabric face masks to raise cash for the World Health Organisation.

The team of expert bridal seamstresses usually help hundreds of brides every year with wedding dress alterations.

But with weddings and other special events postponed indefinitely, The Secret Fitting Room is one of the thousands of small UK businesses which has temporarily closed as part of the national lockdown to slow the spread of Covid-19.

The team is now producing and selling the masks with 20 per cent of the proceeds going to WHO.

Professionally trained seamstress and dressmaker Jennifer French set up The Secret Fitting Room in 2016 after graduating from the London College of Fashion and Nottingham Trent University.

“I’ve never been good at sitting around doing nothing and along with everyone else I am finding living under lockdown a struggle sometimes,” said Jennifer.

“We have helped many brides reorganise or postpone their weddings: it is such a hard time for everyone. I find my job to be just as much about emotionally supporting other women through some very vulnerable moments, as it is about dressmaking.

It was my granny who originally taught me how to sew as a child and, as it runs in the family, we have all started making our own masks.”

“Wearing a face mask is a personal choice, and is no guarantee of stopping the spread of Covid-19 infection” added Jennifer.

“But it may be better than nothing if they are worn, removed correctly and we still all follow all of the government guidelines. Since launching the online shop, we have already sold out in some product lines and received dozens of requests for face masks for children. We are now producing them in fun fabrics such as dinosaurs, pirate ships and animals.

"We are also contacting nursing homes to offer them masks for staff for free or a donation if possible to cover postage and material.”

You can visit The Secret Fitting Room’s online shop to purchase face masks at thesecretfittingroom.co.uk