A VALE crafter and volunteer at a community centre is doing her bit to help the victims of London’s Grenfell Tower fire – patch by patch.

Rhona Thomson, 54, who lives in Alexandria and has been a stall holder at Artizan Centre’s Community Hub in Dumbarton for two years, joined more than 1,000 quilters in a special Facebook group, dedicating her spare time to making quilts for those involved in the tragic tower block fire.

The online group was set up by an avid crafter who felt really passionately about quilting and the disaster itself, and after posting an appeal on social media people were quick to volunteer and offer their help to make the quilts.

Rhona, who has made quilts since the age of 16, said: “Following the terrible events in London in June, I found the Facebook group ‘Quilts for Grenfell Tower’ disaster and really wanted to get involved.”

Rhona, who runs a special needs transport business with her husband, David, and founded charity Comfort Quilts Scotland, hosted a quiltathon at Artizan’s Community Hub in July to encourage the people of Dumbarton to get involved in the project.

She told the Reporter: “Through Comfort Quilts Scotland, I have donated a number of patchwork and craft items to charities including Yorkhill Sick Kids, Senior Care and Spinal Units of Southern General Hospitals and deafblind organisation, Sense, so I felt getting involved in this worthwhile cause would be a fantastic opportunity to make even more charity quilts.

“Since June and after the quiltathon at the Community Hub, I have officially made 20 quilts that are ready to be given to the victims and I donated fabric for a further 35 of them to be made by others in the online group.

Rhona, who has completed multiple qualifications in machine embroidery, patchwork and quilting, slipcasting pottery and is currently studying for a diploma in creative design.

Each patchwork quilt is labelled with a special message from its maker.

She said: “The quilts have been made in a patchwork style.

“I usually use new fabrics with poly cotton sheeting for the back and then use wadding to sandwich the top and bottom together. When binding the edge, I then added the special labels saying, ‘Sending You Love and Hugs in a Quilt’.”

The charity quilts are being collected from all across the UK throughout September and the sensitive matter of distributing them to the survivors of the fire is being organised with the victim’s current situation at the forefront of the coordinator’s minds.

Rhona added: “There has been a quilt made for everyone including babies, couples, young children and teenagers, but these are not only for those that were in the building during the fire, but also members of the emergency services including firefighters, police, ambulance staff and 999 call handlers,” said Rhona.

“Plus, Mercedes Benz and Carillion were a huge help transporting the finished quilts from various destinations around the country to storage units ready for the handover to victims.”

Stewart Gilmour, Artizan Centre’s operations manager, said:“We really commend Rhona for being committed to using her talents to make people, going through a hard time, feel the care that has been put into making her quilts, and we can’t congratulate her enough for such a fantastic achievement.”