AS PART of its ongoing commitment to support local charities, AWE’s charity partner Thrive has received an AWE Charity Fund donation to help its client gardeners flourish at the weekly sessions.

This is the third year that Thrive, one of the leading gardening for health charities, has been AWE’s charity partner. Throughout this time, AWE has continued to support Thrive – through donations or individual fundraising – to help with maintaining its clients’ health and wellbeing.

At Thrive, trained horticultural therapists use gardening and plants to support clients who have a wide range of disabilities, health conditions and support needs. This latest donation will support general gardening sessions to help improve clients’ confidence as well as their physical and psychological health.

One such client is Carly. Thrive’s team has nurtured Carly’s confidence and self-belief to achieve her personal goal of using gardening equipment. Through training and practice she is now one of Thrive’s most proficient mowers and continues to build on her learning. Carly has since mastered using a strimmer and discovered that the sensory experience and the required concentration really benefits her mental wellbeing.

Michele Maidment, AWE’s charity fund secretary, said: “We’re incredibly proud of our partnership with Thrive and our staff have really taken the charity and work they do to heart. We love hearing about the success stories, such as Carly’s, as it demonstrates how donations really make a difference to Thrive’s client gardeners.”

Paul Scott, Thrive’s client services manager, added: “I would like to express our sincere gratitude and appreciation for this latest generous donation from AWE which supports both the delivery of our programmes and the health and wellbeing of our client gardeners.”