The Repair Shop presenter reflects on growing up poor, discovering fashion, and why fame will never go to his head
Born in London in 1970, Jay Blades is the furniture restorer and TV presenter best known for The Repair Shop. His childhood in Hackney was blighted by racism and fighting, until a career in community and social work changed the course of his life. It wasn’t until Blades was 40 and working for a charity which encouraged young people to repair furniture that he discovered he had a skill for crafting and fixing objects. Before finding fame on screen, he got a degree in criminology and philosophy from Buckinghamshire New University, where he is now chancellor. Blades opened the first physical shop for his online brand Jay & Co in Poole, Dorset, earlier this month.
The car in this photo was parked somewhere on Clapton High Street in east London, and I was on my way to a wedding – probably of one of my cousins. I was 13 and looking properly grown-up. I was always tall – 6ft by the time I was 11! But being in that tux, even though I had cheap white sports socks on underneath, made me feel like the governor. Hence why I am posing like that: “Bosh! Here I am!”
