I am relieved that this judgment, once and for all, supports the HFEA as the proper regulatory body for licensing these technologies.”Four-year-old Zain Hashmi suffers from the inherited blood disease thalassaemia. He needs regular blood transfusions but is not expected to survive without a bone-marrow graft or stem-cell transplant.A search for a donor failed to turn up a suitable match, even among his four siblings, so the couple’s only hope is to have another baby. They will use IVF techniques to select an embryo that is free of the disease and tissue typed to provide a match.Critics argued that the process was a step on the road to creating designer babies wanted not for themselves but for certain specific qualities.After a long period of deliberation, the HFEA agreed to sanction the treatment on the basis that the Hashmis’ embryos would have to be selected in any case for those affected by thalassaemia to be screened out. The tissue typing to ensure that the new baby provided a match for Zain was simply an extra procedure that could be done at the same time, it said.The HFEA had refused a request from another couple who wanted IVF and tissue typing to provide a match for an existing sibling, but where there was no inherited disease whose avoidance made embryo selection necessary.Suzi Leather, the chairwoman of the HFEA, said the Hashmis would now be able to continue with their treatment. “Clearly, clinicians cannot always prevent diseases but if they are able to and also save the life of a sibling, then this is a legitimate use of these new techniques.”Dr Vivienne Nathanson, the British Medical Association’s ethics and science spokesman, said: “The Court of Appeal has made the right decision to allow tissue matching to take place in order to save Zain Hashmi’s life. We are delighted for the Hashmi family.”Josephine Quintavalle of Core said: “There are serious issues at stake here and from that perspective it is a defeat for society at large and certainly an overwhelming defeat for parliamentary democracy.”How the treatment could work1 Egg and sperm are mixed to produced fertilised embryos2. Fertilised embryos are allowed to grow to the eight cell stage in petri dish (test-tube)3 One cell is removed by biopsy4 The cell is tested for thalassaemia using genetic markers5 The cell is tissue typed to ensure a match with Zain6.

Once an embryo is found that is free of thalassaemia and a match for Zain it is replaced in the womb7. When baby is born, blood rich in stem cells is taken from umbilical cord and transfused into the sick child to cure the disease. Abe Hamilton lives in a two-bedroom flat in Newington Green, London

Abe Hamilton lives in a two-bedroom flat in Newington Green, London
I moved to Newington Green three years ago. It’s on the borders of Islington, Dalston and Stoke Newington, and what I like about it is that it’s quiet, peaceful and anonymous – a kind of nothingey area – and yet it has easy access to lots of lively areas. Before that I lived and worked from my studio in Shoreditch, in the days before it became really trendy and full of bars and caf? I live in a two-bedroom flat in an old Fifties block, set back from the traffic and with lots of trees in the gardens. When I first moved here I thought I’d miss the Tube, but actually I find it much nicer and less stressful to wander up the road and get the bus; this area has lots of good connections.”When I first moved into the flat, the first thing I did was to undecorate it. Every room was woodchip-wallpapered so I stripped it all down and and took it back to its shell.

It’s more or less stayed in this pretty raw state because I feel comfortable with that natural, unfinished look. Stripping the walls back brought a rough texture to them, and it’s the same with the ceiling: I took off enough woodchip to reveal a selection of pale pastelly blue, mushroom and white from wallpapers and paints over the years.”My view on homes is very much the same as my view on fashion. When I started designing clothes in the Nineties, everyone was power dressing and wearing shoulder pads; my look was romantic and feminine but with a raw, organic, relaxed feel – and that was in the days before people ever used the word ‘organic’. This natural look has endured throughout the Nineties, in terms of both homes and fashion, and it’s a look which is still going strong. I like making use of what you have and taking things back to their natural beauty and working with that.”There are lots of different textures in the flat – smooth, rough, delicate and hard – and I like the contrast between things that are strong and fragile and raw.