Six years in Iran's notorious Evin Prison changes how you view a yard of fabric. When Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was detained in 2016 on trumped-up charges of plotting to topple the Iranian government, she lost her freedom, her 22-month-old daughter, and her identity. She was stripped of her civilian clothes and forced into an oversized, deliberately ill-fitting prison uniform designed to dehumanise her. Time stood still.
But a funny thing happens when a totalitarian regime tries to erase an individual. The human spirit looks for a loophole. For Zaghari-Ratcliffe, that loophole was an old, grey industrial sewing machine resting on a wooden stand at the entrance of the female political ward.
Speaking at the Hay Festival, she shared how crafting became a literal lifeline during her confinement. It wasn't just a hobby to pass the time. It was a calculated, quiet act of resistance against a system designed to break her mind.
The Psychological Warfare of a Prison Uniform
People often misunderstand what prison does to the mind. The physical confinement is brutal, sure, but the psychological erasure is worse. In solitary confinement, Zaghari-Ratcliffe spent nine months without fresh air or natural light. The fluorescent bulbs stayed on 24 hours a day.
The first thing the guards did was take her clothes.
Identical, oversized uniforms are a classic tool of institutional control. When you look exactly like everyone else in a dull, shapeless garment, you lose your name. You become a number. It is an intentional effort to strip away your personal narrative.
When she finally moved to the general ward, reclaiming her identity meant reclaiming her clothes. The prison rules allowed inmates to receive up to 12 garments from their families at the start of each season. No linings, no see-through fabrics, no revealing cuts. Delivery days turned the ward into a makeshift, modest fashion show. Women tried on their clothes and showed them off to each other. It was a rare burst of collective joy.
But getting clothes sent in wasn't enough. She needed to make something.
Trading Compliance for Liberty Fabric
Before her arrest, Zaghari-Ratcliffe wasn't an expert seamstress. She owned a sewing machine her mother-in-law bought her, and she had a stash of high-end fabrics from Liberty London. She used to think those floral prints were too special to cut into.
Prison changed her perspective. Suddenly, the word "Liberty" printed on the edge of the fabric took on a dark, ironic significance. She was sitting in a place with absolutely no liberty, holding a physical piece of it in her hands.
Fabrics were strictly banned in Evin Prison. To get her stash inside, Zaghari-Ratcliffe had to navigate the bureaucratic maze of the prison administration, eventually securing special written permission. Her husband, Richard Ratcliffe, spent weeks coordinating from the UK to get the textiles sent to Iran.
Once the fabrics cleared security, she didn't keep them to herself. She chopped them up and shared them with the other women on the ward. Everyone wanted a piece of liberty they couldn't find anywhere else.
The Politics of the Single Sewing Machine
The political ward had exactly one industrial sewing machine. It was old, clunky, and highly regulated. A sign on the wall restricted its use to between 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM on Sundays and Wednesdays. Zaghari-Ratcliffe was eventually put in charge of running it.
Using that machine became a masterclass in survival. While her daughter Gabriella was being raised by her grandparents in Iran, Zaghari-Ratcliffe sat at the needle and dreamed of a normal life. She stitched matching dresses for herself and her toddler.
The reality was heartbreaking. Gabriella would wear her dress to visit her mother in prison, but because of strict Iranian dress codes, Zaghari-Ratcliffe had to stay covered up during visits. They never got to wear their matching outfits together in the same room.
Yet, the act of making those clothes did something vital: it stretched the walls of her cell. Crafting created a mental bridge to the outside world, a way to travel back to the life she used to have and look forward to the world she might see again. The inmates didn't just sew clothes; they recycled every scrap of material, leather, wool, and bead they could find to make earrings, necklaces, and pins. When an inmate was released, she left wearing handmade accessories given to her by the women left behind. Zaghari-Ratcliffe even knitted a "freedom pinafore" using wool left behind by prisoners who had won their release.
Creativity as an Act of Defiance
You don't need a weapon to resist an oppressive regime. Sometimes you just need a needle and thread. Totalitarian states thrive on total control, attempting to discipline inmates on every physical and emotional level. They completely underestimate individual agency.
By establishing a community of makers inside Evin Prison, the women built a micro-economy of mutual support. They taught each other woodwork, knitting, and embroidery. They read history, philosophy, and feminism. They refused to let their brains rot.
The impact of that survival mechanism didn't stop when Zaghari-Ratcliffe flew back to the UK in 2022 after the British government settled a historic debt with Iran. The trauma of arbitrary detention doesn't disappear just because you pass through immigration at Heathrow.
On February 28, she woke up at 5:00 AM to news of military strikes involving Iran. Panic set in. It was impossible to reach her family immediately. To stop her mind from spiralling into a dark place, she walked over to her sewing machine and sat down. She spent five straight days doing nothing but sewing. It remains her ultimate safe space, a way to process a reality that is often too heavy to carry.
From Evin Prison to the Imperial War Museum
Her prison craft circle has now evolved into something much larger. Zaghari-Ratcliffe recently partnered with the Imperial War Museum and Liberty London to co-design a fabric collection called Creativity in Conflict and Confinement.
The textiles don't just tell her story; they pull from historical archives of wartime resistance. One print, Stitch and Community, layers floral patterns over the historical diary entries of Daisy Sage, a woman interned by Japanese forces in Hong Kong during World War II who embroidered over 1,000 names and codes onto a bedsheet. Another print, Passage of Time, uses imagery of Tehran's rooftops, changing moon phases, and flying birds to mimic the exact view Zaghari-Ratcliffe watched through the bars of her cell windows.
Turning those painful, claustrophobic memories into commercial fabric designs was a brutal process of confrontation and release. But it closed a circle. A portion of the fabric yardage is being donated to Fine Cell Work, a British charity that teaches prisoners paid newline needlework to assist their rehabilitation.
If you want to understand what true resilience looks like, look at the small patchwork cushion Zaghari-Ratcliffe carried home with her from Tehran. It was made from the absolute last scraps of her smuggled Liberty fabric, stitched together on a broken prison machine. It isn't just home decor. It's proof that no matter how tightly a regime locks the doors, they can't lock down human imagination.
Next time you feel completely overwhelmed by circumstances outside your control, step away from the screen. Find a tangible, tactile project. Create something with your hands. It forces your brain to focus on the immediate present, builds a psychological boundary against chaos, and reclaims a small piece of your own agency when the rest of the world feels totally chaotic.
