Shining a light

Shine has trained 8 people to be barristas for the new coffee shop which opened on 11 May.

Shine, a new coffee shop run by vulnerable people who have experiences either homelessness or have been in risk of homelessness, opened in Turnpike Lane London yesterday.

Dozens of local people and supporters of HAGA, recently merged with Blenheim, which has helped many people with alcohol and drug addictions of the years, were there for the opening.

Cafe Art helped with the video for the crowdfunder, based on our experience with the MyLondon Kickstarters.

Crowd funder 

Shine was funded by the public with a crowdfunder last year.

We helped with their crowdfunder run by Spacehive and the Mayor of London. After they were shortlisted to the final 25 projects, they were awarded £9,000 from the Mayor of London's fund and successfully raised £28,861 in total.

The Shine Enterprise Centre, now just "Shine", has an art gallery theme with local artists in recovery and Cafe Art was very happy to be asked to hang a retrospective MyLondon exhibition which is by people affected by homelessness.

The furniture was bought with the crowdfund money but extra stuff was built by clients of the centre. Kevin says last minute requests of stuff, and help painting the coffee shop, came from many volunteers.

Shine will be open weekdays from 10am-5pm for the first few months. The address is 89-91 Turnpike Lane. The closest tube station is Turnpike Lane on the Piccadilly line.

Opening day in Shine which will be open to the public next week.

Kevin Farrell with the Mayor of Haringey and a supporter.

Cafe Art has been given a wall to exhibit a retrospective of MyLondon.