Warm Spaces open as the clocks go back

The Warm Welcome Campaign has launched this year’s Warm Spaces Map as thousands of venues in every corner of the country start to open their doors to their local communities so everyone can access a space to keep warm, connect with others, make new friends, and feel part of their local community this winter.

Last winter, 7,000 Warm Spaces emerged to create the Warm Welcome Campaign, and between them they received almost 2.5 million visits, providing much-needed warmth and welcome. As well as supporting people financially and enabling them to turn the heating off at home, the warm spaces had a positive impact on loneliness and isolation.

A year on – as the cost-of-living crisis has continued to deepen – the Warm Welcome Campaign expect millions more visits to warm spaces this winter, creating a new layer of social support in every community in the country. That’s why the Warm Welcome Campaign is urgently calling for more Warm Spaces to come forward and join us.

The Warm Welcome Campaign has a new online platform to support everyone who wants to open a Warm Space in their community, and offers spaces access to support, resources, funding opportunities and help to get their space ready for winter. Warm Spaces will be promoted by the Warm Welcome online map, so people can find their nearest Warm Space in every part of the UK. Any community space can register with the Warm Welcome Campaign as long as they offer people a space that is warm, welcoming, free and safe.  

Warm Welcome Campaign Director, David Barclay says:

“This winter will once again see millions of people having to choose between heating and eating, and having the lifeline of a warm and welcoming space in their community will make all the difference. But Warm Welcome Spaces are not just a sticking plaster on poverty, but places of dignity and connection. You don’t go there as a ‘service user’, you go there as a guest and as people get involved and get to know each other they forge lasting friendships and often end up becoming volunteers and hosts themselves. People help each other in Warm Welcome Spaces, and that sense of agency is crucial. “

“As winter starts to bite, and the cost-of-living crisis deepens, we urgently need more Warm Spaces to come forward and join us, so we can make sure that no one has to face poverty or isolation alone this winter.”

The Warm Welcome Campaign exists to turn poverty and isolation into warmth and local connection and has a bold ambition to resource, champion and connect Warm Welcome Spaces in every community across the UK.  The campaign is led by a coalition of over 50 charitable organisations and is delivered by the Good Faith Partnership in collaboration with Warm Welcome Spaces.

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