Upcoming 50/50 sale for refurb of Milton Abbot Village Hall

There’s a chance to pick up a bargain and help finish the refurbishment of a local village hall at an upcoming 50/50 sale.

Chris Harrap, organiser of ‘the Big 50/50 Sale’ at Milton Abbot Village Hall, has been overwhelmed with the number of donations received for the hall’s appeal for vintage, new and nearly new clothing in a range of sizes.

These will go on sale at the village hall on Friday and Saturday, September 25 and 26 from 10.30am to 4pm.

Among labels which have already been donated are M&S, Monsoon, Peter Storm, Betty Jackson, Karen Miller, Mind Velvet, Joe Brown and Mountain Warehouse.

The proceeds are 50/50, with half the proceeds going to the Milton Abbot Village Hall Restoration Project, and half to the seller.

However, Chris reports that many people are opting give all the money to the village hall appeal.

The proceeds will go towards the major refurbishment of the interior of the village hall, with the reading room and history room still to transform.

This comes as the installation of a brand new kitchen for the village hall, thanks to a grant of £21,888 from West Devon Borough Council, topped up with about £5,472 from hall reserves.

Chris, bookings secretary for the hall, explained that money was still needed to finish the refurbishment, which started about two years ago when dry and wet rot were discovered beneath the stage in the main hall.

Since then, the committee and the village have worked to raise the money, but a fair bit still remains to be done.

“We have had several things to raise the money and dear old West Devon [Borough Council] have come up trumps,” said Chris. “We still need £60k to finish the refurbishment, the history room and the reading room.”

She said that the kitchen refurbishment has meant replacing pots and pans and utensils, finding out just how hard it is to buy knives these days.

The hall committee has spent a couple of hundred pounds replacing saucepans, for the new hob which ‘hadn’t been invented’ when the original ones had been bought.

Chris urged everyone to come along to the ‘table top’ sale to grab a bargain or do a bit of early Christmas shopping.

She said: “The clothing is amazing. Basically there is going to be something for everyone who walks in the door. Every time I come down to the village, it is really wonderful to see just how much we have to sell. And at the end of the day, whatever we have left over is going to go to a charity helping Ukraine, so whatever clothing is donated won’t go to waste.”

Any donations can be dropped into Chris at the village hall on Tuesday mornings in the run up to the sale.