In this movie we filmed at our Designed in Hackney Day, Sugru founder Jane ní Dhulchaointigh shares her journey through inventing and launching a "space-age rubber" that lets people customise their belongings and endorses the idea that "you don't have to be an expert to do amazing things".

Ní Dhulchaointigh talks about the big plans she had for the air-curing rubber when she left college, but after struggling for years to sell the idea to large adhesive companies she took advice from a friend to "start small and make things good" - an ethos she now recommends to anyone starting their own business.

Her story of self-empowerment shares a likeness with the product, which is all about tailoring things to suit your life and needs so that they "mean more to you", and she encourages both designers and consumers to "start to see ourselves as experts".

See more talks filmed at Designed in Hackney Day here, and see all of our stories about Sugru here.

Taking place at Hackney House in the heart of Shoreditch during the Olympics, Designed in Hackney Day celebrated the incredible diversity of design talent in the borough as well as providing a platform to discuss both the opportunities and threats to creative businesses in this fast-changing part of London. We’ll be publishing more talks from the day on Dezeen over the coming weeks but in the meantime you can find out more about the other discussions from Designed in Hackney Day in our highlights reported here.

Designed in Hackney is a Dezeen initiative to showcase world-class architecture and design created in the borough, which was one of the five host boroughs for the London 2012 Olympic Games as well as being home to Dezeen’s offices.