'Fabric to food' achieves amazing results

Reporter: Ken Bennett
Date published: 23 June 2020


An amazing team of volunteer ladies from Dovestone WI have notched up an impressive first.

That's because in just three weeks they have raised £3,000 as part of their mission to turn 'fabric into food' for needy families.

WI president Jess Moreland said: "Who knew a load of donated cotton bedding, yards of elastic and some seriously dedicated women could achieve such amazing things?

“Our hand-made face coverings have raised this amount of money and every penny has been spent on food for families in crisis - vulnerable and elderly members of the wider community. 

“Due to the pandemic, there’s a lot of hungry and people facing financial problems and while things remain difficult for them, we will continue to do what we can to help those that need it. 

“We have made 1,500 face coverings so far, with more being produced every day by our fabulous team of cutter and sewing bees and our five-strong team who filled trolleys, cars and vans to get supplies swiftly over to Oldham Foodbank and Sandwich Angels.

Jess went on: “Our ‘Fabric to food’ mission is continuing alongside other initiatives and getting fabric face coverings out to people that have asked for them.

“Face mask production is going strong.

"We have been busy processing our bigger orders which will hopefully result in more donations to help us support the foodbanks and Sandwich Angels.

“After posting orders out to London, Nottingham, Suffolk, Devon, Wigan and Wales, we have also been asked to supply to Oldham Council (MioCare), Oldham Rotary (shielding and vulnerable families), Royal Albert Infirmary, GoToDoc and the Big Issue.”

She added: “We also had a plea from two separate community nurse teams - one team needed 60 face visors, which we sourced and dispatched, with the help of Ben O’Hana. 

“The other had been let down with a scrub order, so Dovestone WI sorted out 125 scrub gowns in record time, with 125 scrub bags too - thanks to Carry on Delph for some of these bags.

“Then, after we were tagged into a post from Oldham Royal Hospital wanting tiny blankets for the NICU babies a week ago, we now have a batch of freshly knitted mini blankets heading their way.

"Those bees of ours that don’t sew, sure can knit quick!”

Jess also paid special thanks to Ever After Flooring from Mossley and Canine Motor Vehicle Recovery for their special support.


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