‘Our bakery provides a future for women in need’
Alice Williams is passionate about helping others – and she’s helped hundreds of women to bake their way to a brighter future
In 2012, I was working in a community cafe in East London. In the cafe, we prioritised giving back to the community. Our customers included women from a nearby hostel, who’d experienced violence, alongside poverty and homelessness. We sold delicious cakes, which always went down a treat with them. Many were struggling to find work and it was clear that more job opportunities were needed locally. This sparked an idea – why not use the skills we had in the food industry to help more of these women find jobs?
Before joining the cafe, I’d spent four months volunteering with an organisation in Bangkok, Thailand, which helped disadvantaged women exit the sex industry by teaching them how to make and sell jewellery. That experience had opened my eyes to just how much learning vocational skills could change a person’s life.
Along with a couple of colleagues from the cafe, I began to develop a baking workshop for women. I am not a baker but I knew that baking was fun and, crucially, it’s an accessible trade, no matter your education or employment history.
To begin with, we trialled the workshop in the local hostel, where we set up tables and baking utensils in the communal area. It was chaotic at first, with tables becoming buried by ingredients and there was lots of noisy chatter. But the workshops offered a way for the women to start to open up with one another. The process of sifting the flour, beating the eggs and combining the batter was very mindful. And feeling fulfilled really helped to grow the women’s confidence and self-esteem.
Spurred on by this success, in 2014 we moved to the kitchen of a local church and got funding from various charities and foundations to set up a programme called Luminary, which I co-founded with Sarah Harrison, a volunteer chef at the hostel, and food blogger Abigail Mifsud. The idea was for experts to come in and train women to bake at a professional standard. It also covered more general skills for employment, such as food hygiene certification, CV writing, communication and money management. Armed with these skills, our graduates could then make cakes that could be sold to restaurants and cafes.
Women were referred to us from hostels, refuges and social services. Many had been through traumatic experiences, so it took time for them to build trust. Slowly but surely, a small sisterhood began to form. When they completed the course, we held a graduation ceremony, with gowns made by one of the students. That was really emotional. Everyone was so proud and some of the women brought their children along to watch. Despite everything they’d been through, these women had such drive and determination to build a different future.
Over the years, we’ve taught hundreds of women. Most of them have gone into employment or on to further education.
One woman – who’d been trafficked to the UK – was so nervous on her first day that she stuck by her support worker’s side the whole time. She’d never baked. Week by week, she came out of her shell and mastered the art of baking. Now, she runs her own cake business, and her creations are phenomenal. She’s also returned to teach classes for us on decorating cakes with fondant. I don’t think any of our current students would believe that she used to be so shy and nervous.
More recently we’ve been able to buy a professional kitchen and open the doors of our own bakery in Stoke Newington, staffed by women from our courses and stocked with their creations. We’ve built a great name for ourselves and caught the attention of the Duchess of Sussex. In 2019, she was at the launch of our second bakery in Camden and got involved with cake-decorating. Seeing her work alongside the women we were helping was a huge moment for all of us.
But it’s the smaller moments that I find most fulfilling. Like when I walk through the kitchen and see a woman carefully placing the finishing touches on a beautiful wedding cake that has been specially commissioned by someone who knows what we are doing. Luminary is much more than a bakery. It has evolved into a community that provides hope for a better future.
Visit luminarybakery.com
Slowly but surely a small sisterhood began to form