11:30, 14 December 2020
Words by Smiley Team, Staff Writer, London
As the countdown to Christmas gets closer, children at Bush Hill Park Primary School in Enfield had a special visit last week from Santa Claus, receiving over 75 gifts for pupils and their families from local charity Hearts & Helpers.
Supporting families who are in need this Christmas, after a difficult year for many households, Adrian White, founder of Hearts & Helpers, was joined by volunteer Victor Shodiya and Santa Claus as they delivered presents to the school.
Hearts & Helpers launched the ‘Santa Comes to Town’ project after successful initiatives across the summer to help local homeless community members, families who needed rehoming and those fleeing domestic violence.
Hearts & Helpers provides crucial support to rough sleepers, the formerly homeless and those who are transitioning into new accommodation by providing them with food and essential goods to support their day to day needs, ease financial burden and create a better living environment.
Working with communities across London, Hearts & Helpers mission is to provide essential goods and services to positively impact the lives of those around them. Founded by Adrian White in 2019, founder of independent fashion label Hubert and Calvin, the charity also provide rough sleeper support kits including mobile phones and run a trainer drive every month for the homeless.
The aim of the Christmas project was originally to share gifts with between 30-40 families referred to the charity by Enfield Council, however, after an overwhelming amount of positive reaction and donations from the local community, Adrian extended the project so more families in need could be part of the charity outreach.
Adrian, who grew up in Enfield, and still lives locally with his family, said: “We work with vulnerable people and those affected by homelessness and the more we do to help, the more and more families we are approached to support."
"We now work with around 100 people each month, and I’m so happy to be able to extend this help to children and their families in one of our local schools. We want them to enjoy the gifts and to know that they come from a kind, caring community that wants to make them happy.”
Joseph McCann, a School Governor at Bush Hill Park Primary School, and instrumental in inviting Adrian to help, said: “It was wonderful to see the children with the gifts and I am so grateful to be able to help the families in our school community after such a tough year.”
Headteacher, Anna Theodosiou, is so grateful for the gifts which will be distributed to as many families in need as possible in the run up to Christmas. “Huge thanks to Hearts and Helpers! I can’t put into words the difference this will make to families. We will continue to do everything we can for our school community to let them know that we are here for them.”
As part of the Santa Comes to Town project, Hearts & Helpers will be transforming a VW camper van into a mobile Christmas grotto and delivering hot meals to those affected by homelessness across London on the 19th and 20th December.
Hearts & Helpers are also running a quarterly trainer drive, where the local community donate unwanted, quality and clean footwear which is then vetted before being distributed to the local homeless population.
Had to www.heartsandhelpers.org to find out more and to support the charity's work.
