Whitley Bay High School A' Level Art Exhibition
After a break of a couple of years for obvious reasons it was a joy once again to be involved with the amazing Whitley Bay High School A' Level Art Student Exhibition.
We had the huge honour to be asked to judge the wonderful work that was proudly on show at the Exchange in North Shields for their 'Best in Show' award, donating a £50 FTLOTN voucher to the winner.
It was such an uplifting experience to see the students work and the talents they have. They are the next generation of artists and creatives and from what we saw these hugely gifted individuals have a very bright future ahead.
Fiesta Whitley Bay
Around the North East it's great to see so many events that are designed to bring the community together. In our home town of wonderful Whitley Bay there's such a strong community spirit and one such event that is doing great things with that community is 'Fiesta'.
Beginning last year and held on various Sunday's throughout the year, each Fiesta is based on a different theme. Everyone can come along to enjoy stalls, music, community games, refreshments and a treasure hunt.
There's so many costs and steps involved in setting up a new event so wanting to help we continue to pay for the insurance for each Fiesta Festival and it's wonderful to see it now established as one of the town's community events.
Ukraine Hope Stationery Box
Like so many of us watching the terrible events unfold on television we wanted to do something to help to help the people of the Ukraine. We know from the way in which our amazing community got behind the 'Love Will Get Us Through' prints for Northumbria NHS during that very first lockdown just how much they get behind such a worthwhile cause.
We worked with a number of hugely talented artists on putting together a stationery box based around the theme of Hope with 100% of all profits of the box donated to the Red Cross Ukraine appeal. Each artists came up with an amazing design that appeared on prints, a notebook, bookmark, greetings cards and a pin badge. The designs absolutely bowled us over and so perfectly fit the theme.
We're so proud that our amazing community raised £1000 for the Ukraine appeal. They really are a wonderful bunch.
In that past few months we have also:
- Offered the outside space of our shop to online based small businesses to give them the opportunity to have a face to face offering.
- Sponsored a table at the Cullercoats RNLI Spring Ball.
- Provided raffle prizes for various fundraising charities across the region.
- Lucy volunteers with the Smartworks charity, coaching long-term unemployed women to get back into work.
All these things we love doing and it all helps to make a positive difference in our wonderful region.