Fighting clothing poverty
In March we had our 8th successful Southwell Swishing clothes swap event held at the Old Courthouse on the Burgage in Southwell. A befitting location surrounded by local history and next door to the police station!
Attended by around 60 women it was a fun night with lots of clothes swapping and trend styling. As usual we always support a chosen charity and donate the leftover clothing to this cause – something that is important to us with our conscious values. This time we chose to support Sharewear - a Nottingham based clothing scheme who offer free-of-charge clothing choices to people in economic difficulty, using a combination of a referral system for individuals and an outreach service for organisations.
Sharewear Clothing Scheme was founded nine years ago by the organiser's son - who having worked in a food bank realised that people needed clothes too, but that no such organisation existed.
They became a Registered Charity in November 2016, and have since grown from being completely volunteer led to now having four employees who work alongside a dedicated team of volunteers from a variety of backgrounds. Many of whom are people who have used the service and ask to join the team to support others.
Following the clothes swap we prepared many bags of clothing to donate to the scheme and met with the team to have a quick look round and be amazed by the scale of their operation. The clothing range covers all types for all ages from birth upwards, including bedding.
Outside the Sharewear distribution centre with Manager Jo Ellis - dropping all the bags of swap clothing that attendees were happy to donate
Sharewear support those who suffer from clothing poverty - including the homeless, prisoners who are discharged with only the clothes they are wearing, families who live in a refuge or extreme poverty, and UK immigrants. This is not about people who need more clothes, but people who have no clothes. They have helped many people through desperate times in their lives and have deservedly won awards for doing so. Including being named one of the top 100 Changemaker organisations by the Big Issue in 2020. Then in December 2021 Founder and CEO Louise Cooke was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Business Administration by Nottingham Trent University in recognition of her achievement in establishing an organisation from scratch and growing it to be the leading voice in the UK on the issue of clothing poverty.
To find out more about the charity and see how to donate please click the link below.
We need to send a HUGE thanks to our ever loyal Southwell Swishers who swapped clothes, listened to our trend talk, chatted and laughed with new found friends, and made the evening another win for our Conscious Community!
Sarah and Lisa April 2023 xx
And finally to all our Conscious Community, some wise words from the late and great….
“The fashionable woman wears clothes. The clothes don't wear her.”
RIP Mary Quant 11/02/1930 - 13/04/2023