Supporting the community since 1922: Halliford WI

From the 1920s Shepperton boasted three WI groups – Shepperton Village, Shepperton Green and Halliford. Due to falling numbers the three WIs are now together as Halliford WI.

Over the years these three WIs were involved with many local projects – a lending library, pantomimes, dances, whist drives and jumble sales. They visited sick and elderly people in the community and provided gifts at Christmas. During the war years they were involved with knitting for the troops and generally supporting the war effort at home. They embraced National WI resolutions with litter picking and raising cash for Denman College. More recently, Halliford WI has campaigned for a local bus shelter and raised money towards a defibrillator to be kept outside a local church for community use. They were also involved with ‘Spelthorne in Bloom’, raising money for hanging baskets in the area.

This project influenced the design of our banner. The flowers allowed ladies to provide a piece of fabric or buttons (some from the button boxes of strong influential women in their families) which were added to the banner. Another strand to the banner design was to use the suffragette colours.

Twelve ladies contributed to the making of the banner and nine were involved with the actual stitching. We held three sessions when we stitched and discussed our aunts, mothers and grandmothers and the influence they had on us.