Future Heist

I sat down with acclaimed science journalist and award-winning author Lucy Jones to discuss her book Matrescence at Bookmarks Bookshop in London.   In Matrescence, Jones examines the emerging concept of matrescence; the idea that the transition to motherhood is as physically and mentally transformative as adolescence - and yet this transformation is sidelined and neglected by capitalist society.  ...

It's not all rainbows and girl boss feminism - in this Women's History Month special for 2024, I take a deep dive into the history of International Women's Day, first founded around 1911, and how working women's needs have not always matched up to the ideals around bourgeois, capitalist, feminist standards. I trace the history of how motherhood ideals and the way in which parenting is structured u...

We meet Katie Scrafton, the mental health activist behind the Instagram account @thingsididsober .  Katie has been diarising her journey with a sober-curious lifestyle since August 2019. By charting her successes and feelings, what she’s getting out of it and what she’s finding difficult, she inspires others. We discuss finding a balance with alcohol, Dry January, how to quit drinking, the effect...

Clare Farrell is co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, the environmentalist group who lead huge protests against climate change. Alongside Greta Thunberg, they have helped force a conversation on global warming all over the world through direct action. Having worked full time as fashion designer for high street and luxury labels, Clare felt so strongly about the fashion industry's damage to the envi...

Dave Randall is a guitarist and founder of Slovo, and has previously toured with Faithless, Sinead O’Connor and Dido. As an activist, he has campaigned for Love Music Hate Racism, Freedom for Palestine and the People’s Assembly Against Austerity. This year, he released the third album under his band Slovo titled Bread and Butterflies, which he finished under lockdown. In 2017, he authored a book,...

The Outside Project is a LGBTIQ+ homeless shelter, community centre and support service. We met Harry Gay, Campaigns Manager, and a community activist who has previously worked with refugees and in local action groups. ⁠ Homelessness has been a long-neglected problem for decades. Cuts to social services and growing inequalities have seen numbers rise. Yet the Coronavirus pandemic prompted funding...

As the Black Lives Matter protests erupt around the world, I sat down with Brian Richardson, a criminal barrister and anti-racist activist. Now a leading figure in Stand Up to Racism, he has worked for the Anti Nazi League and has been involved in the campaign for justice for the Grenfell community.. As a barrister, Brian has only ever done defence - standing up for some of the poorest and most ma...

Dr Megan Parsons is an NHS doctor who specialises in mental health, who works in London. The narrative around frontline workers has been one of heroism since the global pandemic began. While it is undeniable that health workers have been doing a fantastic job for the sake of us all, the reality is much more bleak. Austerity and government cuts have brought the NHS to its knees even before the cris...

Francesca Manning has been a primary school teacher for four years. She is a union rep for the National Education Union, and is active with her local NEU committee in South London.  As the death toll from Covid-19 continues to rise, parents and teachers are grappling with the UK government’s target to re-open schools to children beyond those of key workers by 1st June. We discussed how damaging it...

Tansy Hoskins, an author and journalist based in London. In March 2020, she released a new book “Foot Work: What Your Shoes Are Doing to the World”, an exposé of the shoe industry, and the damage it is doing to workers, consumers and the planet.  Tansy’s previous book, Stitched Up: The Anticapitalist Book of Fashion, is one of my favourites exploring the political issues in fashion. It’s a 360 deg...

Sarah Ann Macklin is founder of the Be Well Collective to improve mental health and wellbeing in the fashion industry. A model for 15 years, Sarah Ann has worked for designers such as Vivienne Westwood, and magazines from Vogue Italia to Esquire. Against the backdrop of a demanding career in the spotlight, Sarah Ann's journey of self-care lead her to train and open a Harley Street practice as a nu...

Women have routinely been written out of history, sidelined and forgotten. So have the working class. Dr Louise Raw, author of ’Striking a Light: the Bryant & May Matchwomen and Their Place on History’, in the book, she challenges the idea that the Dock Strike of 1889 was the first major strike in British history, and instead looks at an industrial strike the previous year, led by women, that was...

In July 2019, Future Heist recorded a live podcast at Marxism Festival 2019, a celebration of socialist ideas. Podcast host Rena Niamh Smith presented a political analysis of the fashion industry, looking at how the fashion industry has misshaped our consumption of clothing, why style should be respected as an art form by socialists and revolutionary styles from the past. The discussion, with memb...

Moyra Samuels has lived near Grenfell Tower for over 30 years. On 14th June 2017, she watched in horror as catastrophic fire raged through the residential block, killing 72 people. She immediately became involved in the relief operations in the community following the fire and is now Project Manager for Justice4Grenfell. A long-time activist from South Africa, Moyra grew up under apartheid and was...

Tony Sullivan is Senior Lecturer in Cultural and Historical Studies at London College of Fashion, UAL. He is contributing author in a new book "Fashion & Politics", which looks at fashion from the mid 19th century to today and how it has been used to express nationalism, terrorism, surveillance and individualism. His chapter, 'Dressing the Opposition: Sartorial Resistance on Europe’s Political Lef...

Jasmine Fischer has been a vegan for 5 years, but her politics has changed over time. While she still believes people should consider the environmental and ethical impact of their decisions, she believes veganism is an individualistic approach that will not end the suffering of animals. For Jasmine, the meat, dairy and egg industries are driven not by cruelty alone, but by capitalism. Only by dism...

Aimée Cohen is a co-founder of 52GIRLS. 52GIRLS aims to bring together a space for women, trans, non-binary people and allies to bring empowerment to the foreground. The event aims to celebrate women’s exploration of music and women in music. Aimée co-founded the event with Raissa Pardini. The regular club night, which has held events in East London and Glasgow, puts women, femmes, trans and non b...

Zak Cochrane is the National Organiser at Love Music Hate Racism, a platform set up in 2002 to challenge the growth of the far right. Born out of the Rock Against Racism movement, which goes back to the 1970s, Love Music Hate Racism organise gigs that allow people of all backgrounds to mix, over a shared love of music, and empower the anti-racist message by showing how we have more in common with...

Taban Shoresh was a teenager when she escaped genocide in Iraq. She escaped to the UK, where she grew up, but quit her City job to go back to Kurdistan to help refugees displaced by conflict, and set up Lotus Flower. Lotus Flower is a non-profit that supports women and girls impacted by conflict and displacement. They empower vulnerable women and girls so that they are safe, have opportunities to...

When Saffiyah Khan stood smiling in the face of a screaming member of the English Defence League in Birmingham, little did she think she would become the face of a multicultural, confident youth in the face of racism. Recorded in the summer of 2018 a year after that picture went viral, we catch up with Saffiyah, now signed to model agency Elite and a photographer and activist.  Now volunteering wi...

Bonnie Fechter is a fashion label by Sarah Buchanan and Rosie Ingleby produced entirely in the UK which challenges the seasonal structure of fashion collections.  They say: "As designers, we've always been really passionate about clothing and design, however, quickly became disillusioned by the fast fashion industry and how it encourages a throw-away culture. We wanted to create a conceptual cloth...

When motion designer Hedvig Ahlberg was a student in Stockholm, she and some female classmates noticed that women tended to take a backseat in creative projects, allowing male classmates to be front and centre with their work. Once in industry, she saw the trend continuing, so she co-founded Punanimation (now Panimation) with Bee Grandinetti  and Linn Fritz , a multi-platform community of equality...

Naima Omar is an activist across anti-racist and anti-austerity campaigns. She is also a Muslim who wears a hijab. In this episode, we discuss the right for women to wear what they want, and the way in which the media often misrepresents Muslim women, as well as the real and frightening threat posed by growing Islamophobia. Follow Naima Omar on Instagram @naima_omar1994. Follow Future Heist on Ins...

We sit down with mens fashion designer Bethany Williams. Bethany Williams believes that social and environmental issues go hand in hand and through exploring the connection between these issues we may find innovative design solutions to sustainability. She wants not just to comment on a community, but work in their social spaces to try to create a change through furthering economic gain for charit...