Happy Christmas to Centrepoint

On Wednesday, the Beauty Bible team had a really rather fantastic day. For 12 years, we've been involved with Centrepoint, the London-based charity that helps young homeless people. (Fellow supporters include the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge: William was taken to Centrepoint by his mother Diana at a tender age - and it made a big impression.)

As well as organising regular 'Make A Difference' makeovers for the young women involving many big names from the beauty industry, every year our hard-working committee puts a shout-out to solicit goodies which will make up 250 Christmas presents for young women at Centrepoint's hostels. The generosity is amazing.

This year (among many others), brands who were generous enough to donate included John Frieda, Manuka Doctor, Elemis, Dr. Organic, Estée Lauder, Clinique, Bobbi Brown, Marie Claire, Bioré, Aromatherapy Associates, Soap & Glory, The Sanctuary Spa, Babyliss, Jo Hansford, Kenzo Perfumes, Mary Kay, Dr.Hauschka, Jergens, Weleda. (Forgive the not-so-great iPhone pictures - but we wanted to give you an idea of how fantastic the contributions were.)

We were blown away by the donations - but not as blown away, we suspect, as the young women will be when they open their bags. As Centrepoint's Head of Funding John Raynham says, they will 'Light up the young women's faces on Christmas morning'.

The packing team is below, and huge thanks to everyone: Ines, Sophie, Kirsty, Sharon, Jo, Sharron, Amy, Beth, Lisa, Michelle and Sarah D. (that's our Sarah S. at the back), and of course our 'token man' Dave - who's more usually found carrying boxes and recycling cardboard for us at Beauty Bible Towers. (Actually, we had two chaps: Centrepoint's John - see above - was as usual fantastic.)

If you'd like to help Centrepoint's wonderful work, visit www.centrepoint.org.uk. Just 40p a day will put a safe, warm roof over a young person's head. Though as we've seen ourselves, that's just the start: what this amazing organisation really does is rebuild lives.