Saskia Hampele

The Popular Actor With a Passion for Social Justice Is Using Her Platform to Make a Difference to the Lives of Australian Women

- Emily Taylor

While acting was Saskia Hampele’s first love, the small screen didn’t feel like a viable career path growing up in Perth in the ’90s. Instead, a desire to help others led to a university degree in social work and subsequent employment in youth and homelessness services. Television, though, came calling again, and when the offer of a regular gig on Neighbours arose in 2012, Hampele grabbed it with both hands and spent three years on Ramsay Street. Seeking a way to combine both careers and use her newly elevated profile to give back, Hampele launched Gift Box Organic in early 2017 through a crowdfunding campaign. The initiative provides homeless women with access to safe feminine hygiene, working to address the fact that more than 1.1 million Australian women live in poverty and struggle to afford sanitary products each month. In just over two years since the project’s launch, more than 12,000 women have been positively impacted through Hampele’s tireless work.

INSTYLE: You have an unusual background for a professional actor. How do acting and social justice intersect?

SASKIA HAMPELE: Being an actor requires you to look inwards a lot, focusing on yourself and what you can achieve as an individual. I’ve [often] felt awkward about that aspect and [have] never been that great at selling myself or talking myself up. I’ve always felt [a] sense that the world can be a brutal and unfair place, and that we as a community can be doing more to support those less fortunate. I’d like to think I’m doing my own little part in making a difference in the world.

What gave you the idea to start your business?