Esme Young is back on our screens for the Christmas edition of The Great British Sewing Bee – and we can't wait to see what she and fellow judge Patrick Grant have in store for the new line-up of celebrity contestants.
Esme, 75, has amassed a legion of fans since joining the show back in 2016. But how much do you know about her life off-screen? Here's all we know, from her job away from the cameras to her love life…
Esme's life away from the cameras
When she's not busy filming the show in West Yorkshire, Esme lives in London. The fashion guru has lived in social housing for 40 years and rents her one-bedroom flat in Islington, north London, from the charitable housing trust, Peabody.
She told The Telegraph in 2022: "It is rent controlled and I have tenure for the rest of my life."
© Love Productions/James Stack/BBCThe TV star also owns a beach hut on the north Kent coast.
Esme's job away from The Great British Sewing Bee
While viewers will know Esme as the stylish judge of the BBC's hit sewing competition show, she has a different job away from the cameras. Esme is a lecturer at Central Saint Martins, a prestigious London art school from where she graduated decades earlier.
Esme is also a big name in the fashion world, having founded the brand Swanky Modes in the 1970s with fellow fashion designers Judy Dewsbury, Melanie Herberfield, and Willie Walters. The label quickly rose to prominence thanks to superstars Grace Jones and Cher favouring their designs, with their clothes appearing in magazines and newspapers such as Vogue, Nova, Honey, The Sunday Times and the V&A Little Black Dress Book.
![Esme [right], with her Swanky Modes colleagues, Judy Dewsbury and Melanie Herberfield](https://images.hellomagazine.com/horizon/original_aspect_ratio/73d7ed42e78d-esme-young-swanky-modes-colleagues.jpg)
As well as The Great British Sewing Bee, Esme has made celebrity guest appearances on numerous other TV shows, including The Weakest Link, House of Games, Celebrity Antiques Road Trip, The Wheel and Who Do You Think You Are?. In 2022, she published an autobiography, titled Behind the Seams: My Life in Creativity, Friendship and Adventure from the star of the Great British Sewing Bee.
Esme's hobbies away from the show
Judging from her Instagram page, Esme likes to use her time off work to travel and has shared snaps from various amazing locations and tourist spots around the globe, from the seaside town of Budleigh Salterton and Dumfries House in Scotland to Naoshima in Japan.
Esme's love life
While Esme tends to keep her romantic life out of the spotlight, she did previously reveal that she's not married and doesn't have children.
"I've never felt broody," she told RTE in 2022. "I mean I like children and in a way their [her siblings] children were my children too. I never felt an urge to get married."
© Love Productions/BBCEsme's family life
As the second of five children, Esme comes from a big family. She was born in Bedford to parents Brian Pashley Young and Patricia Josephine Cole. Her father was a career officer in the RAF, and was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1944, a Commander of the same order in 1960, and a Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1972. Her mother was a secretary who worked as a nurse during the Second World War.
© @miss_esme_young/InstagramTaking to Instagram back in April, Esme shared a snap of her with her four siblings. In the caption, she wrote: "Me and my siblings."
