The spirit of Brighton and Hove is undoubtedly carefree and fun, yet charitable and eco-friendly. What better way to combine these two aspects than with a huge pillow fight for a good cause?
The Bucket and Spade Cafe, located in the arches underneath King’s Road, is hosting the event on International Pillow Fight Day on 1 April, but this is no April fool. All pillows left behind will be collected by the cafe staff and donated to homeless charity Shelter.
More than 2,200 people have shown an interest in the get-together on its Facebook event, leaving the cafe’s owner, Lisle Jackson, awestruck.
“It’s been going really well, we’ve tried a few events that haven’t really taken off but this has just gone crazy,” he said. “We were scratching our heads thinking about what we could do to help out as well as to get a bit of publicity and this has blown up,” he added.
Calum Lawrence, who works part-time at the cafe, came up with the idea after stumbling across videos of flash-mob pillow fights on Youtube. Lisle loved the idea but only expected 50 people to turn up, so after the event went viral, questions about using the platform for a good cause arose.
The pair decided on Shelter because homelessness is an issue close to home for Calum; he was sleeping rough on the streets of Brighton just a year ago. Lisle and his staff also see homelessness first hand every day because of the cafe’s beach-front location.
Lisle said: “We were thinking about what would be the most environmental thing we could do. We wanted to raise awareness for the homeless situation so what better way to do it?
“I was motivated by having a café down here where I see homelessness every day, all day long. Seeing people walking past and asking for money and sleeping in the shelters up the top and we got to the point where we were like, we don’t want to just keep giving them food and money, let’s try and do something a little bit different.”
The exact location of the event is to be confirmed; the boys have had to rethink their options because of the massive amount of interest the event has generated. They are also appealing for pillow-fighters to bring donations of toiletries, socks, and other non-food essentials.
“A cup of tea and some change may only last a couple of minutes so socks and that are better when you’re cold to your bones,” said Calum.
You can RSVP to the event on Facebook, and find out more about the Bucket and Spade cafe on its website. Best of luck, boys!
