teapigs have recently supplied some of our peppermint tea samples to the Astell Foundation – they are carrying out really important work with homeless people across London. Here is Jude from Astell with a little bit of info about the work they carry out and how teapigs fans can get involved!
“Astell Foundation is a homeless charity formed in March 2009 that seeks to relieve poverty amongst the street homeless of London, irrespective of gender, ethnicity or faith. We operate three programmes in order to achieve our goals. Red is an emergency service offering hot food, hot and cold drinks, advice and an opportunity to start rebuilding lives. Amber is the place where change takes place, through custom courses. Green is a programme that integrates our guests back into society again through housing and employment. We have housed over 50 people to date and found employment for over 16 people.
Our Red programme, has been going for two and a half years and serves up to 130 people every Saturday in South Kensington. It's a space where anyone who is street homeless can access and receive advice, amazing food and the opportunity to start restoration (through Amber) It's so important that we provide not just good quality food and drink but choice too. When someone lives a life where they have very little choice, it's hard to feel like a human being. We recognise that choice and exercising this choice is fundamental in what empowers us all. That is why we have vegan, vegetarian, meat and gluten free meal options. We also want to make sure we have significant choice to cater for all needs within our hot drinks department too.
teapigs very generously donated naturally decaffeinated peppermint tea to our Red project. This is a huge thing for our guests for different reasons. Firstly, they are given choice, which as discussed before is imperative. Secondly, they are also given quality which is an affirmation, in part, of the infinite value of a human being, not just to be given what's available, but to be given the best, makes our guests feel incredibly special. Finally, it offers a healthy alternative, which for people living on the street is very important too, and it gives us the opportunity to promote a healthier diet to our guests.
There are plenty of ways to get involved with Astell, if you are local to South Kensington, you can pop down on a Saturday night and volunteer at Red, just get in touch with us through the website (www.astellfoundation.com) & let us know you are coming. If you can't make it down, we have a host of online volunteering posts available from journalism to simply "liking" our Facebook page, drop us a line (jude@astellfoundation.com) and we can tell you more. And finally for the more active there are various runs you can support us on, most notably the Royal Parks Half Marathon, for which we have limited spaces still available please drop us a line!”
