United Kingdom

Rebecca Bissonnet The Repair Shop

Rebecca Bissonnet Biography

Rebecca Bissonnet is an accredited textile conservator and embroiderer. She is an expert on BBC’s The Repair Shop, featuring Jay Blades. She is a Textile Conservator at RB Textile Conservation, a studio based Hampshire specialising in the preservation of individual and collections of historic textiles.

According to her LinkedIn profile, she worked for the Historic Royal Palaces from June 2016 to December 2021. As a Textile Conservation Supervisor, she led a team of five conservators in the conservation care of the State beds, throne canopies and tapestries at Hampton Court and Kensington Palace. As a Senior Textile Conservator, she Project managed the de-installation, wet clean, filming, conservation and re-installation of a 17th Century Mortlake tapestry.

The Textile Conservator has also worked for The British Museum; Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar; Royal School of Needlework; National Museums Liverpool. According to her website, her clients include The National Trust, The Houses of Parliament, Eton College, St Johns College, Oxford, English Heritage and Salisbury Cathedral.

As a freelance textile conservator, Rebecca worked on a variety of textiles for private clients and museum’s including The V&A; Museum of London; Longleat House; Hardwick Hall and part of the team of embroiderers who worked on the Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding dress.

Rebecca Bissonnet The Repair Shop

Rebecca Bissonnet is a textile conservator in The Repair Shop on BBC One and iPlayer. She made her debut on the hit BBC show in April 2024.

Rebecca told the Express how she joined The Repair Shop: “The Repair Shop rang me as they were looking for a textiles expert. They had found my details through my website and I actually missed the call because I had just popped next door to the village shop to buy cherry cake!”

“They had found my details through my website and I actually missed the call because I had just popped next door to the village shop to buy cherry cake!” Thankfully, she returned the call promptly and after connecting via Zoom, she nailed it.

Rebecca shared details of how filming went and said the practical work was challenging, yet rewarding. “Some of the stuff brought in would be so expensive to fix, as it’s so time heavy,” she admitted.

“So we’re helping restore, repair and conserve items, giving conservation to people that may not necessarily have the resources to have them restored themselves and it means they’ll now be future-proofed and be around for years to come.”

Instagram

Rebecca’s Instagram handle is bissonnetr.