Pipe Cleaners Made in the UK

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Pipecleaner Arts & Crafts| Hewitt & Booth

Craft

Uses & Applications

With nearly 100 years in creative thinking, it only seems fitting that a lot of our time and dedication goes into producing unique, bespoke, quality pipe cleaners for the craft market. We understand that crafters need quality, and creative minds need the freedom of materials to let their creativity flow.  Having our production here on site, means that we have the flexibility to alter lengths, widths, colours, yarn fibres….finding the solution for any art & craft application.  Indeed we produce our pipe cleaners in 40 different colours, a variety of widths and any length up to 600m!

Case Study - SheepyThings (Hertfordshire, UK )

SheepyThings are a small handmade craft company specialising in unique sheep related gifts, they also happen to be our longest standing craft customer with historical orders dating back 30 years! The company’s success was down to its owner Alison White, who’s passion for crafts was noticed by BBC television’s Blue Peter, after exhibiting her work at the Barbican Centre, London in 1984.

After Alison’s exhibition in London, she was invited to appear on the Blue Peter program along with some of her works, one of which was a sheep mobile, made from pipe cleaners and fleece. At the time Alison sourced her pipe cleaners from tobacconists and then died them black, but after the appearance on Blue Peter, viewers wrote in explaining to her that they had found coloured pipe cleaners in craft gift packs. After finding out that pipe cleaners were available in other colours, Alison went to the library and looked up ‘Pipe Cleaner Manufacturers’ in a directory, which is how she came across Hewitt & Booth and we have been trading with her ever since.

 

 

www.sheepythings.com

SheepyThings have tried other makes of pipe cleaners over the 30 years Hewitt & Booth have been trading with them but they have always returned, with a high preference for quality as well as friendly and efficient customer service. Now SheepyThings have a large variety of products that are sold all over the world, including Japan, Australia and the USA, but mainly here in the UK, in particular the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales.

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Alison White

(Owner, SheepyThings)Hewitt and Booth pipe cleaners are definitely the best for consistent quality, strong yet pliable with excellent coverage. I have tried other makes but always return to Hewitt and Booth.

Case Study - Contemporary Crafts (El Torrent, Spain)

The word “craft” can sometimes be deceiving, in that many people associate the word with hobbies and leisure pastimes.  However, one company based in the small countryside town of Mieres, in the Pre-Pyrenees between Barcelona and France has developed a thriving business from crafted products and are using our pipe cleaners to create unique lighting pieces, primarily designed for the restaurant and hospitality trade.

Pipecleaner Arts & Crafts | Hewitt & Booth

 

www.eltorrent.com

We are constantly amazed by the versatility of our pipe cleaners, when they are combined with a creative mind to mould them into something truly amazing. El Torrent use our red, black and coral chenille “bump” pipecleaners, which we supply in 15 metre coils rather than short length stems so they can cut them to the lengths they need.  They then combine them together with chrome, black graphite and Swarovski crystal, to make unique lighting art, sold in over 47 countries. The flexi-stems are the perfect choice of material, as they can be moulded into any shape and cut to any size, whilst still having long-lasting stability qualities.

Montse Barbena

(Buyer, El Torrent)Our designers were inspired to use pipe cleaners as a material due to their unique appearance and flexible qualities. While trialling them in designing our lamp, we used Hewitt & Booth and continue to do so because of their fast and quality service

Case Study - Shoebutton Bears (Cheshire, UK) & Occasions Bears (Bedfordshire, UK)

One popular use for our pipe cleaners is to craft miniature bears, in fact, three of our regular customers buy from us specifically to make and sell these lovely hand-crafted pieces. One of these customers is Shoebutton Bears, a bespoke maker of hand crafted pipe cleaner bears and animals, mainly trading through craft fairs and independent craft retailers.

We have worked closely with Shoebutton Bears for many years to develop a product that has the right flexibility and thickness to create one off, realistic miniature bears. We supply them with 6mm and 4mm diameter chenille stems in “teddy bear” colours e.g. chocolate, sahara-beige, nutmeg and various greys.  As a specialist hand-crafting company, they do not require large scale production quantities, and we are able to make these short bespoke runs possible.

Pipecleaner Arts & Crafts | Hewitt & Booth

We have also worked with Occasions Bears, who also make miniature bears and animals out of our pipe cleaners. Occasions Bears found our company through searching the web, after being dissatisfied with the quality and size of pipe cleaners they had previously bought elsewhere online. As we manufacture such a variety of colours, lengths and thicknesses, we were able to supply them with the colours and styles they require, which are 9mm stems in white, light beige, dark beige, and light grey.

Sue Wilkes

(Owner, Shoebutton Bears)I use and continue to use Hewitt & Booth products, because they produce the best quality pipe cleaners

Jill King

(Owner, Occassions Bears)The quality of Hewitt & Booth pipe cleaners are lovely as they stay fluffy as I work, so I'm very happy with them and the price is great