This is an edited version of our monthly newsletter. The full version, including meet up dates, is available to members only. To find out how to become a member, drop us a line via our contact page.
Hello everyone
Welcome to the November edition of the BWI Newsletter
WI Business – October meeting
At our October meeting we welcomed Sarah Slater, Hampton Court Tour Guide, who gave a fascinating talk about Kirtles, Corsets and Curtains: historical female fashion from the C16th to C20th. For Copyright reasons she asked for no photographs, so if you’re lucky, maybe you’ll see her at one of her tours of Hampton Court at some point.
November news
AGM
Venue: The refurb of St Vincent de Paul is still not completed, so our AGM will be held at Hawkins Forge Pub, 110 Battersea Rise, SW11 1EJ. Doors open 6.30 for a 7pm start. There will be our usual social and a raffle. Tuesday is their Pizza Night for anyone planning to stay after the AGM.
The AGM reminder will include links to the Annual Report and the Financial Report so that you can read them before the meeting. Very limited hard copies will be available on the night.
Adviser/Tellers: Angie Leach from Surrey Federation will be in attendance and 2 members from Chelsea & Fulham WI will act as tellers if needed. Please note that our usual hall is not going to be available so members should keep an eye out for details of the venue for this meeting.
Remembrance Day On 11th November our Joint Presidents will be laying a wreath on behalf of Battersea WI at the Remembrance Service in Battersea Park. Starting at 10.45am, Members are welcome to join them.
Website Some of you may have recently experienced problems accessing the website. As you may be aware, globally there have been issues affecting everyone from Libraries to banking apps like Revolut. We’ve migrated to a new hosting company to mitigate this and stay secure from potential cyber attacks. We’re also creating a new Facebook page as we know not everyone is on Instagram, so do visit.
And finally Don’t forget to check our Offshoots section for local events and information, as well as Surrey Fed and NFWIsections for the latest news. 2-6th November is Get the Nation Learning week and VIA is offering some free courses
See you all soon
Sue L and Sue M
Joint Presidents, Battersea WI
presidentbattersea@surreyfedwi.org.uk
Contents:
- Forthcoming speakers, events and meetings
- Your BWI Groups – activities and updates
- Offshoots – local news and events
- Surrey Federation news and information
- NFWI news from HQ and information
Forthcoming speaker, events and meetings 2026/7
(Running order subject to change according to availability of speakers.)
2026
17th November – AGM Hawkins Forge, 110 Battersea Rise.
15th December – Christmas Party (hopefully St V de P Church Hall)
2027
19th January London’s Air Ambulance charity
16th February Ali Epton, Fit to Flourish (wellness talk)
16th March Catherine Aubert, Amelie’s Follies, breast health and bra fitting session.
20th April Singing with Zara McFarlane
Your BWI Groups – activities and updates
Book Groups – what we’ve been reading
Battersea Bookends update by Caro. The Last Runaway is set in the mid-nineteenth century US, when parts of the country were only just being settled. Honor Bright is a young Quaker woman from Dorset whose world is turned upside down when she’s jilted and moves to America not only to accompany her sister who is to be married, but to escape the oppression of her situation and have some chance of making a life for herself. Her life is turned upside down again when her sister dies and she carries on travelling.
As we follow her journey to Ohio, the book rather ambitiously tries to cover a huge number of topics from family life, racism, being a pioneer/a settler, to the importance of quilt making in the underground railroad, the values of Quakerism : “Putting beliefs into practice is harder than preaching them”. “It is easy to condemn slavery outright without considering the consequences”. “The southern states grow cotton using slaves, the free northern states make the cotton into cloth”. “If slavery were abolished tomorrow America would fall apart.”
It was felt that too much was centred on quilting and the young and naïve Honor and not enough was explored about other characters, the underground network and runaways, their stories and their resilience. Some sympathy was lost with Honor’s ungrateful and judgemental attitude, mainly when her actions put the network at risk. The end is a bit sugar coated when all falls into place and she tells her childhood friend in Dorset “I am learning the difference between running from and running towards”. In her own way, she’d been free but nonetheless a runaway, so did Tracy Chevalier intend this wider meaning?
Overall, we all agreed that Tracy Chevalier is a good and very readable, strong historical writer who meticulously researches her books and we enjoyed this one.
Boozy Books update by Amanda. In October we had a choice of reads and these are our reviews:Agent Zo by Clare Mulley, to tie in with September’s speaker, was rated 5 stars. It is a “meaty” book full of background information and detailed explanation. The readers found it interesting, factual and offering a different viewpoint on WW2. It was described as an eye opener of a book and the bravery of women shone through. Those reading this book had yet to reach the end. All her Fault by Andrea Mara scored 4 stars. The book had us hooked and it is fast-paced based around the unrelenting guilt and scrutiny placed on modern working mothers. The climax reveals a darker web of manipulation. You can’t put this book down.The Anatomy of an Alibi by Ashley Elston is exciting and bingeable. The book delighted by being a different concept to the usual detective mystery. The plot can feel weighed down by an overloaded cast of characters, giving it a rating of 4 stars.Emma of Normandy by Patricia Bracewell (a trilogy) earned itself 4 stars. This is fiction based on reality and set in an era of history not usually visited. There is obvious scholarly research into a poorly documented time. The book does not read like a dry academic text instead it is full of court intrigue and plotting.
Chapter One Reading Group update by Jane. In October we read Things Can Only Get Better – Eighteen Miserable Years in the Life of a Labour Supporter 1979-1997 by John O’Farrell. Despite the downbeat subtitle and the serious backdrop of politics we found much to interest us and to enjoy in this personal memoir of John’s years spent as a Labour activist in Wandsworth. Overall it is very funny and full of warmth. John joined us for our meeting. He told us more about the experiences described in the book and also about how the book was developed and the impact which it had on his own career when it spent weeks at the top of the non-fiction bestseller list. It was particularly delightful to discover more about how images for the book cover were chosen. (Book covers are a bit of a theme in this group’s discussions)
Coffee Morning – update by Clare GH. We had a good coffee and talked about the film Fatherland, which Film Club had been to see the evening before.
Craft Group – update by Elaine. Correction to October newsletter: in my excitement about our prize winning prowess at Edenbridge & Oxted, I missed out Sue M’s 2nd prize for her gorgeous carrot cake, so we actually had FIVE placed wins. So here’s a new grid which includes Sue’s cake. I hope many more of you enter next year’s! I’ll keep you posted here about 2027 plans. Meanwhile, we’re really looking forward to our joint outing with Knit, Crochet & Sewing Group to see The Longest Yarn.
Cribbage ♣️♦️♥️ ♠️ update by Derinda
The cribbage group reconvened at Battersea Arts Centre on 6 October for an exciting three-way game. Cribbage is most commonly played by two players but fun when we get the chance to extend to three. We are always ready to welcome newcomers!
Film Club update by Julie.
Eight of us went to see this month’s film Fatherland – a post-war drama that follows author Thomas Mann and his daughter Erika on a 1949 road trip across the ruins of a divided Germany. Sandra Huller is outstanding as Erika (she really is one of the best actors around) following her amazing work in Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest. The look of the film is incredible – the black-and-white cinematography is gorgeous and it creates a real sense of time and place. We all thought the film was great but a few of us felt a bit out of our depth with the plot: it’s a smart movie that expects you to know your history, and we agreed it would’ve been good to read up on the main character and his beliefs before seeing it. That said, we were totally in agreement about how it ends; the ending is just beautiful, incredibly poignant, and so well done.
Foodies – update by Amanda
October meetup was a sausage tasting evening boosted with mash, onion gravy and a bean cassoulet. The sausages all had an even spread of votes so no overall winner! The sausages we sampled were : Waitrose Cumberland Pork Sausages; M&S Heritage Gold Pork Sausages; Dugard and Daughters Butchers Lamb and Rosemary Sausages; No 1 Waitrose Wild Garlic Pork Sausages. Click on this link for the bean cassoulet recipe.
Green Living, Sustainability and Foraging – updates by Elaine
Green living tip: this month Clare G shares a recommendation of a new gardening book, Thomas Rutter’s The Ethical Gardener available from the library as an ebook as well as it from on paper. Much of what he recommends is probably stuff that most of us do anyway, but it’s very nicely written and illustrated. He’s a London-based gardener who trained at the Garden Museum. It’s a great book for anyone who wants to garden responsibly but doesn’t know where to start.
Climate Ambassador update
If you missed the VIA screening of the National Emergency Briefing on climate and nature in October, there’s a chance to see it on 17th November at St Mary’s, Battersea. The Surrey Climate Ambassadors meeting took place just after the VIA screening, I’ll report back on that in December’s newsletter.
Meanwhile, Chris Packham’s petition to hold a UK wide briefing on climate and nature risks is going to be debated in Parliament on 16th November 2026. A video and transcript will be sent to signatories. You can also watch the debate on You Tube. See the Parliamentary Petitions website for more information
Right to Grow, Wandsworth – have you spotted an unused or underused space in Wandsworth that could become a community garden, food-growing area or space for nature? Transition Town Tooting is creating an open-source map of potential sites across the borough. If you know of a suitable space, please send us its location and a few details via this form. Every space could be an opportunity to grow something! If you want to get involved there is also a Whatsapp Group Join the WhatsApp group here.
Battersea Climate Action Team Met with WBC’s Cabinet Member for Environment, Ethan Brooks on 26th October. It was interesting to discover just how wide his remit is: Waste and Streets, Air Quality, Climate Change, Parks and Green Spaces (including cemeteries), Sport and Leisure, Libraries, Arts & Culture, Opposition to Heathrow expansion T3. He sits on the Environment Overview & Scrutiny Committee (EOSC) and is also on the WRWA Board and is a Governor of Roehampton Forest School. Despite reduced budgets following the Council’s latest Spending Review. he remained positive about supporting both the Biodiversity and Climate Action Plans and is keen to continue engaging with local groups. He is very approachable, so if you have any issues you’d like raised (we’re planning to meet him again in January), please let me know.
For more information about the WI’s Climate Ambassador Scheme click here
Knitting, Crochet & Sewing update by Joan
We’re back, refreshed after our summer break! I’ve been busy knitting chicks and penguins for Trinity which will be stuffed with chocolate to sell and raise funds. Sue’s made great progress on the longest knitted caterpillar! Here’s also a photo of Barnaby wearing a little baby hat sewed together from various purchases. In November we’ve a joint outing with Craft Group to The Royal Hospital to see The Longest Yarn – Britain at War.
Outings Group update by Amanda.
In September we had a very interesting day out at The Coming of Age at the Wellcome Collection. This explored ageing from adolescence to elderly and took us a long time as so much to see, experiment with and think about. The picture below shows the cycle of life. After lunch we moved onto the Treasures Gallery at the British Library to see masterpieces like the Magna Carta, Shakespeare’s Folio and the Beatles lyrics.
For our October outing we visited the ‘Baa-Ewe’ Tapestry celebrating Shaun the Sheep: The Beast of Mossy Bottom at the Natural History Museum. The needlework was very regimented and the jokes made you giggle. We went onto view the Fixing our Broken Planet Gallery. This is where whale ear wax tells us about ocean pollution, how fungi-based fertilisers support food production or how European bison are helping us to store more carbon. The gallery took a positive view on our future which was reassuring.
Simply Sketching update by Vivien
This month the Sketching Group took inspiration from a YouTube fellow sketcher who draws buildings in his native New York using a very simplified & speedy method. We soon realised that some of us were rather resistant to quick sketching! But we had a happy and companionable time, drawing and painting using photos from magazines or pictures from our phones, and we all decided that it was nice to work to a theme, even loosely, pushing us just a little out of our usual comfort zones.
Walking Group update by Clare
We had our regular monthly morning walk on Friday 2 October, a pleasantly sunny morning. This one started close to home, with eight of us plus dogs Tiger, Bertie and Barnaby meeting up at Clapham Common’s newest café, Spread On The Common. We inspected the tree planted by BWI in 2025 to mark the WI’s 110th anniversary, the Wetland Zone and some other recent biodiversity iniatives on the Common before crossing South Side and checking out the Clapham Orangery, a Grade II listed structure from 1792 now marooned the mid-20th century Notre Dame housing estate. Our four mile route then took us through quiet residential streets and another estate to find the Brixton Windmill, built in 1816 and still (occasionally) milling flour today. From there it was a short walk to Brockwell Park, where we visited a thriving community garden, a tranquil walled garden and Brockwell Hall. This grand 1813 villa sits at the heart of the park, enjoys an amazing view over London, and has just been attractively restored as a community centre and events venue. It was fun to sit outside its Glassmaker’s Café in the sunshine, relaxing over coffee and cake while watching guests in full evening dress coming up through the park on foot or in a golf buggy for that day’s wedding. There was plenty of interesting chat but eventually we followed the empty buggy down to the park gates, for a 37 bus back to Clapham Junction, agreeing that we’d all enjoyed discovering so much new history so close to home.
Offshoots
Jeanne Rathbone has spent years walking the streets of Battersea, carrying the stories of women this city has forgotten. Join us to celebrate the legacy of the project with its self guided audio version at our community sharing event.
The recording of her September walk is now becoming a free self guided audio tour. Made in Battersea. About the women of Battersea. By a team of women from Battersea. Women’s stories. Women’s voices. Women’s work. This is what it looks like when intangible heritage is taken seriously before it disappears.
This is a drop-in event. Booking is not mandatory. By reserving your spot on Eventbrite, we will be able to send you email reminders and an advance link to the self guided audio walk so you can download it in advance.
Rose Club Room, Ascalon St, SW8 4DL, 4-6pm, 2nd November.
Christchurch Gardens memorial 75th anniversary celebration update by Clare G.
The Battersea Society held a very successful community planting morning in Christchurch Gardens on 20 October 2026 together with Enable Parks, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of its unique little 1951 memorial shelter to the civilian war dead of Battersea, 1939-45. Members Clare G, Jenny and Sue M all turned out, as did the Mayor of Wandsworth and a group of children from Sacred Heart Primary School down the road. Follow the link for more photos!
If you have anything for publication in our next newsletter, please email us with your text and photos. Articles and photos may also be included on our website as well as Instagram and Facebook posts.
Surrey Federation
Battersea WI is a member of the Surrey Federation of WIs.
SFWI’s monthly newsletter is emailed to all members and is packed with information about everything from events to workshops. You can also access it via their website.
NFWI – news from HQ
Get the Nation Learning Week – VIA 2-6th November
It’s Get the Nation Learning Week from 2nd to 6th November, and we’re opening up a selection of courses free to everyone. Cook miso butter beans with roasted pumpkin, meet the unsung heroines of science and maths, or get savvy before your first craft fair.The campaign is about making adult learning feel normal, visible and shared: not something you only do for a qualification, but something you can keep doing throughout life because it builds confidence, opens up opportunities and helps you stay connected.Have a look at what’s on, choose something that sounds interesting, and if someone comes to mind while you’re browsing, send it their way too!
Thank you for reading! This is an edited version of our monthly newsletter. The full version, including meet up dates, is available to members only. To find out how to become a member, drop us a line via our contact page.