Amesbury woman smashes fundraising target by making poppy masks

An Amesbury woman has raised over £400 for the Royal British Legion by making poppy face masks.

When Tracey Johnson found out that the charity were not going to be able to do collections this year, she thought she would do something to help.

So she decided to make face masks with poppy designs on them to sell, with all the money going to the British Legion.

She set a target of £200, but just a few weeks in she has already smashed that and now wants to raise £500.

Tracey told Greatest Hits Radio:

"I think it's so important to support a charity like Royal British Legion right now because our veterans need all of the support they can get, obviously we are a military area and I was told they might not be doing the collections with the poppy tins this year so I thought I'm going to help."

Tracey is part of the Salisbury Makers Hub on Facebook, who are also doing something similar for the Royal British Legion.

The group are doing a big push on their mask trees at the moment and in the last week of October and first week of November, they will be populated with poppy and camouflage masks.

Any money raised will then go to the charity.

LOCKDOWN DONATIONS

Like many people across Wiltshire and Hampshire, Tracey started making face masks for the public and key workers when the UK was put into lockdown.

Since then she's made nearly 4,000 of them, including some for a mask tree outside of her home.

In doing so, Tracey raised £1,392 which she has already donated to a number of charities, including:

• Stars Appeal
• Women's Aid
• Salisbury Women's refuge
• Wiltshire Air Ambulance

Tracey said she's proud of the money she's raised but she mainly just wanted to get masks out to everyone:

"My main aim was for people to get a mask without having to pay extortionate prices that commerical places are charging, the donating to charity does feel good obviously but the priority was just to get a mask out to everyone."

The poppy face masks are by order only and you can do so by messaging her on Facebook.