Season’s Greetings from Walton Charity

This year has been truly remarkable, marked by exciting events, valuable collaborations, and overwhelming generosity from our supporters.

At the same time, we have witnessed the growing challenges faced by local people, particularly working families. This has made our work more vital than ever—providing grants, green spaces, housing, and initiatives like The Bridge to support Elmbridge residents and tackle poverty across our community.

A heartfelt thank you to our partners, volunteers, staff, and trustees for making this year such a success. We look forward to continuing our work together in 2025.

Scroll down for our 2024 highlights!

Here are some of our highlights from 2024:

• The Bridge appeal raised £30,104. This means our community hub can remain open for longer, providing ongoing support to working families through its till-less shop and advice services. The incredible kindness of the public and our corporate partners resulted in over £15,000 being donated to the appeal, including the £6,000 that was raised by our small yet mighty team of Thames Bridges Trek volunteers, every penny of which was match funded by us.

• We hosted our first pre-loved school uniform pop-up shop, which provided 356 items of clothing. For some of the children that received new uniform, it helped transform their confidence about starting school.

• We are thrilled to be the Squires Long Ditton Charity of the Year! The first event was the Plantathon, where our staff and residents planted autumn containers which were sold to the public. We also got stuck in at their Christmas shopping evenings, offering a raffle with tantalising prizes from local corporate partners.

• Our residents have worked closely with RHS Wisley to launch an exhibition called ‘The Making of a Modern Day Herbal’. The exhibition explores the healing powers of plants and nature, and is on display until 26 January 2025, so still time to visit!

• We have recently welcomed new residents into our purpose-built affordable properties for key workers. We hope that they settle in well and create lots of happy memories in their new homes.

To read more about our 2024 highlights, click on the pictures below!