Business is booming for fashion firm launched two-and-a-half years ago in boss's living room.

CLOTHING made by a North-East manufacturer is being snapped up by celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, Jemima Khan and Renee Zellweger.

Howard Nicholson, 43, started Red Rox as a firm specialising in sports wear at his Durham City home two-and-a-half years ago.

Since then, it has branched out into high fashion, making garments for London designers including Alice Temperley, Cath Kidston, and Victoria Beckham's stylist Wale Adeymi.

Now clothes created by the firm, which recently moved to a small factory at the Dragonville Industrial Estate, near Durham City, are being worn by celebrities and gracing the pages of Vogue, Tatler and Elle.

Managing director Mr Nicholson said business was booming.

"I started working from home in my front room, and originally there were only two of us," he said.

"We started as a sports gear manufacturer, but realised that we couldn't survive doing

just that.

"We got involved in a local textile task force, which gave me the idea to approach designers, and we

got our first contract two years ago."

The firm now offers a range of services depending on designers' needs, including making up garments from patterns and screen printing.

It still makes sportswear, supplying such labels as Le Coq Sportif, Fila and Admiral, and manufactures designer children's wear, aprons and bags.

In a recent advert, the Queen was pictured beside a vacuum cleaner with a Red Rox apron superimposed on her.

Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine, of the BBC2 programme What Not to Wear, have been among those to endorse its products.

Mr Nicholson attributed the firm's success to its 27 staff, who have more than 400 years' manufacturing experience between them.

"Our success is a tribute to the levels of skill we have, and our adaptability and flexibility," he said.

"The girls in the factory have been in the textile industry for many years and most of them are highly skilled. The textile industry in the North-East has been decimated, so there's quite a pool of skilled labour."