Some of City Gateway’s Young leaders and 100 Women Youth ambassadors have teamed up to launch a brand new Girl’s Network for Tower Hamlets residents aged 13-21, through which they hope to provide a forum for girls to discuss any issues that are affecting them, become more involved in their local community and organise fun activities including pamper days and film nights.

The Network launched on Wednesday with a special Valentine’s themed pamper day, which was organised and run by 19 year old Beauty Student Alima Begum. Alima also successfully secured a grant to cover the costs of the event, so huge thanks to her for all of her hard work.

At the event group of 13-19 year old girls were invited along to sample and practice different hair and make-up styles in preparation for a competition on the 8^th of March. Each girl brought along her own hair/make-up model and we had a professional photographer on hand to capture their artistic efforts- watch this space for more photos.  

As well as getting involved in a therapeutic pamper session, girls had great opportunity to get to know some new people and swap a few stories over pizza. The first session was a huge success and plans are already in place to run a follow up event.

There will also be a final live competition at the event at Lansbury Lodge, where the girls will be asked to exhibit their models and attendees will be required to vote for their preferred look.

Prizes will be awarded in two categories: one for the make-up look that receives the most votes and one for the most creative hair styling.

To engage the older generation of women in Tower Hamlets, we invited a group of local women, who are all over 60 years old down to our centre. The women who attended took part in a coffee morning-come-focus group, where we discussed the types of issues that affect them, and what 100 Women could do to help.

After explaining 100 Women to the women, they were all very vocal and had lots of great opinions to the questions we asked. The women ranged from 60-90 years old, and we invited a wide range of cultures and races. One of the attendees was none other than the grandma of City Gateway’s CEO!

The women seemed to be happy that someone was asking what they thought, they loved being heard, and giving their opinion. With all the wisdom and experience in the room, how could we not listen!

The woman discussed issues such as activities for the elderly in Tower Hamlets, Beauty secrets and the most popular topic: young people! The women all had very strong opinions on how they felt about young people, their children, how they would like to connect and engage with young people, what they could cross generation teach, and what they would do to change the future of our young people.

The women inspired cross generation basic IT lessons, as well as knit & natter, our new knitting course. We have also launched keep fit for the elderly and boxercise classes.

We strive to make this project by women, for women, which is why focus groups are so important. We need to hear what our ‘service users’ really think, and gather their ideas and feedback so we can really make this project as effective as possible.

One of the women from the focus group really stood out among a lot of big characters. Her grace and wisdom shone as she discussed issues such as migration, generational divides and cultural differences between young and old. She was so infectious we invited her back to become out Over 60’s Ambassador. Since then Indu has attended our Ambassador meetings and given her input on discussing the project, and is now a voice for her community within the Ambassador team.

Wednesday 22nd September 2010 was the day for celebrating women in Tower Hamlets. At the City Gateway Women’s Project in Poplar, East London, women from all over Tower Hamlets came to launch an exciting new project.

100 Women is City Gateway’s most recent community initiative, to celebrate the huge diversity of women in Tower Hamlets by empowering them to tell their own stories. By March 8th 2011, the centenary of International Women’s Day, we will have collected 100 inspiring stories from 100 local women.

City Gateway already works with hundreds of women every week, and 100 Women seeks to recognise the key role that each of these women play in their own communities. They come from many different social backgrounds, cultures and generations, they all now live or work in Tower Hamlets, and they all came to City Gateway to find new opportunities. With such a melting pot of ladies sharing their stories, 100 women looks to bridge the gap between local communities and the international firms which work alongside, and to cross generational divides.

To launch the project with a bang we knew we had to do something very special - we decided to throw a party and invite as many women as we could to share our vision of 100 women with them, and get them involved. Punch and nibbles were passed around, while women laughed, chatted and discovered the wealth of opportunities available to them through 100 women, including courses in Journalism, Photography, Beauty Therapy, Creating Writing and Knitting. Local residents signed up to take part, whilst business representatives discussed ways in which they could lend a hand.

After the mingling, we were treated to a multicultural fashion show, showing off the traditional dress of each nation represented by party guests – this was so popular that several more guests spontaneously got up to take part! Davinia McFarlane, the Volunteer Coordinator for the Women’s Project, then explained how women could take part in 100 Women, after which everyone was whisked outside for the pinnacle of the celebrations.

100 balloons were distributed to 100 women, and we all patiently waited to release them into the skies of Tower Hamlets. Each balloon had a card attached to it, which explained more about 100 Women and had space to fill in your own story.  Our hope is that when the balloons are discovered in their various resting places, and women across London will fill in their stories and get a flavour of what it would be like to get involved with 100 Women, and then return the card to us…so here’s hoping!

The talking stopped as we all took in a deep breath and started the countdown ‘10, 9, 8…’ excitement and optimism in the air as the balloons endeavoured to get away, ‘…3, 2, 1’ and 100 Women was launched! We will now be working tirelessly to collect 100 stories from 100 women, deliver our exciting new courses, engage the local community, and prepare for 100th International Women’s Day. If you want to get involved or find out more please visit our website - 100women.citygateway.org.uk. And if you find a balloon, you know what to do!