A Peterborough retailer has hosted 50 days of free summer holiday activities for 3,000 city children.

The free arts and crafts sessions were made possible thanks to a sponsorship between retailer UNITY and Bourne Skip Hire, who pledged £5,000.

The partnership meant that 3,000 children could take part in activities such as vegetable music workshops, macrame, lyric writing, DIY wormeries, and clay modelling.

Kez Hayes-Palmer, co-founder of Up The Garden Bath and UNITY, said: “We hate the thought of charging parents to provide children’s activities, which is where our friends at Bourne Skip Hire supported us to make this all possible.

“Between us, we have used the space at UNITY, inside our Queensgate store, to do something truly amazing and beneficial for our community, to help ease the cost of living and cost of parenting."

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Chris Seggie, managing director of BSH Recycling Bourne & Peterborough, added: “At Bourne Skip Hire Recycling we’re proud to be sponsoring Up The Garden Bath and supporting their important work in educating the next generation about sustainability."

One of the classes even saw youngster Collette win an art competition, and her sunshine pelican design is now on sale at UNITY, with the six-year-old collecting all the proceeds from her sales.

“Some days there were upwards of 100 children inside UNITY enjoying our fun activities,” Kez added.

“Parents were amazed this was a service we could offer and we ran out of leaflets on the first day.

“It reinforces what Up The Garden Bath does and we are already planning our Halloween activities, which we’d love to help team up with potential funders on.”

Last year, the eco-group took part in Kids Kingdom events, which Up The Garden Bath supported through planting activities, in North Square.