I had a lot of clothing to donate

Give Your Best is a non-profit organisation giving donated quality clothing to asylum seekers and refugees. Gillian Harvey finds out more.

-  Gillian Harvey

FEW of us consider the simple act of choosing what to wear a privilege. It was this realisation that drove Sol Escobar to set up nonprofit organisation Give Your Best, which enables those in need to select their own clothes for free from an online catalogue of donated items.

"Until 2020 I'd been volunteering at weekends at a Calais refugee camp, as well as supporting resettled families in my home town," Sol explains.

"When lockdown hit, I was forced to pivot.

"I connected on Instagram with a young woman who was an asylum seeker in a house with other individuals all surviving on a tiny allowance."

"They were struggling for clothes, especially as, due to lockdown, the charity shops were closed.

"Plus, without bank accounts, they couldn't use online retailers.

"I had a lot of clothing to donate at the time, so took pictures of it so they could choose what they liked."