Limavady Hen’s Shed: A safe space for local women

A community group in Limavady has been providing local women with a safe space to socialise and learn new skills.

The Hen’s Shed was formed back in 2019 as part of the Limavady Community Development Initiative (LCDI) in the town.

Completely voluntarily led The Hen’s Shed was awarded charity status two years ago.

The Hen’s Shed has been a huge success, with the group meeting up every Monday night at LCDI.

Karen Heaney, Chair/Group Lead of Hen’s Shed, said the group offers a wide range of activities.

“The group is all about social inclusion and making it affordable too for women in the area,” she said.

“We would do a range of activities like arts and crafts which includes glass painting, pottery, drawing and knitting. Then we would do yoga and mindfulness, as well as having talks from different organisations. The ladies would have a couple of day trips too where they take part in team building.

“Usually on the first day back in September we like to ask the members what they want to do and go from there. We would source the cost and if it's feasible then we ask who wants to do it.”

Speaking about the group’s ‘ending violence against women and girls’ programme, Karen continued: “The ladies in the group had been voicing their concerns on attacks on women in the local area. It came up that the council was offering funding so we put in for that. We wanted to have a programme to raise awareness and give the ladies some tips on what to do if they were going through anything. We offer mindfulness and then we will be running a six week programme of boxercise to give the ladies confidence in self-defence. We will also have talks from Women’s Aid and Aware NI, as well as art therapy and learning how to journal for our minds. We are also hoping for an awareness walk through the country park where the attacks against women have been happening. We are hoping to get the majority of the community involved in that.

“By doing this we are showing our stance against violence on women and girls. Hopefully it will let people know this behaviour is not acceptable in our community.”

The Hen’s Shed means a great deal to the women in the local area who attend. Karen says the women get so much out of the meet ups.

“The women have said they are so grateful for the group. They say before coming they wouldn’t have spoken to anybody or they wouldn’t have left the house. Since coming to the group they are out and about nearly every evening doing something. They all strike up friendships when they come here and then they end up going to different groups together. Even when the group is off in the summer months they will meet up on their own and go for coffee or walks. It’s amazing to see the women progress, that’s what I love about it all. Some of them come in barely speaking and by the end of it are teaching the class how to knit. It keeps us going seeing the people coming in knowing that they need the service.”

The popularity of the group is growing but like most registered charities Limavady Hen’s Shed faces challenges including the availability of funding in order to survive.

Speaking about this Karen said: “Our biggest challenges are keeping the engagement there because it is such a wide group and also the availability of funding. We don’t fit into a lot of the funding that’s there because we are isolated to women. Every year the funding for community projects is getting less and less. You are nearly jumping through hoops to get it. We try to do at least two big fundraisers throughout the year.”

The Limavady Hen’s Shed meets on a Monday evening at LDCI. The age range is 40+. The average age is 50-70 years old. To register you can drop by and fill in a registration form to show interest. It costs £3 a week to attend. Tea, coffee and light refreshments are offered at the group also.

For more information and to keep up to date you can follow Limavady Hen’s Shed