February 2026 News
The Scrubbery has received a letter informing us of developments regarding the Oasis Academy Putney, our home base. Due to a sustained decline in pupil numbers locally, there is a proposal by Oasis Community Learning to close the Academy at the end of this academic year. This proposal is currently subject to consultation and the final decision rests with the Secretary of State for Education.
We are now in conversation with Fleur Anderson, MP for Putney, and officers from Wandsworth Council about our future within the building. It is council owned and will revert to them should the lease with Oasis come to an end. At present, the Scrubbery has a ‘licence to occupy’ but this is with Oasis. Fleur’s office is in touch with Adam Browne, director of The Oasis Academy Trust to discuss the situation in detail. Fleur has also written to the Education Secretary in support of keeping the school open. In Fleur’s words: ‘Oasis is such a fantastic school and it’s dreadful seeing it being forced to close.’
There will be no immediate change to our current arrangement.
However, we do need to be planning a future for The Scrubbery. This will involve discussions with the council and any other future landlord. Rosie is exploring the possibility of a multi-agency community hub.
The Scrubbery would like to collect a portfolio of ~200 letters of support from our community whether you are a volunteer, beneficiary, donor or supporter. Please could EVERYONE write a few lines about your connection with the Scrubbery; how you are involved; what you enjoy about it; the benefits it has brought for you; the importance of its work and why it is worth continuing.
Some of you have already done this for previous editions of the newsletter but it would be great if you could update them and send them to Rosie at scrubbery.stitch@gmail.com
The Scrubbery website
The website began as a means of hosting sewing instructions and patterns. Updating it has been on the to-do list for some time. Rosie is pleased to announce that this job has now been done, in between Scrubbery work, child care and a PhD…
Please can we encourage you to visit it and feel free to comment or suggest improvements. This is a shorter newsletter to give you time to read the website.
Deliveries
80 drawstring bags have been delivered to Dan at the Wandsworth Food Bank. The foodbank provides emergency food, support and advice to local people facing hunger and hardship across the Borough. During 2025 they provided 13,054 emergency food supplies to local people. Rather than single-use plastic bags, these bags are reusable, long-lasting, colourful and discreet. Over the years we have provided more than 3,400 of these to them.
Candlewax
After Christmas, the collection of candle wax has been very successful across three local deaneries who have been happy to donate. This has increased awareness of The Scrubbery’s work in the community and in Ukraine. We have sent more than 2,500 trench candles to Ukraine so far but we need to carry on, it is -26º in places at the front line.
We are always looking for volunteers, Toby is officially our youngest camouflage net maker, at the age of 4, although he hasn’t yet learned to sew he can still help. Rosie sent this picture to our friends at School 73 in Lviv, and the English teacher responded “Little Kid is doing Big Deal ☺️”.
Call Out
We urgently need:
Clean empty tins to accommodate all the wax we have collected!
Ibuprofen
Flat food and treats to roll into the camouflage netting when packed up, for example:
food in sachets that can be reconstituted with boiling water including soups and pasta
wafer biscuits
food bars
packs of sweets
thick warm socks (new) and gloves
reusable hand warmers
hand hotties.
This ensures that the food gets to the front lines and is a surprise treat.
If you are a Community group or organisation that would like to launch a tailor made campaign for collecting aid that will appeal to your demographic, please do get in touch, we are open to discussion, there is so much need and so many ways that people can help in small ways to make a huge difference.
