Pop-up wracks were set up in Highbury with clothes for those in need to take free to get through the cold winter or for anyone with spare items to leave something that could be used by others.

The “take one leave one” racks appeared on Thursday (Feb 29) at the Highbury Roundhouse centre in Ronalds Road to help families in poverty and for the community to get involved by providing warm clothing for others.

A banner read “If you need, take one — if you can help, leave one” hanging over racks filled and replenished with clothes.

“The idea needs people’s support to succeed,” Highbury Roundhouse director Andrew Berthier pleaded. “The idea is to help vulnerable families while the Roundhouse provides a warm and safe space for all.”

The project was the third to appear in the area, following pop-ups in Exmouth Market in Clerkenwell and at Wesley’s Chapel in Old Street.

The idea has been going for eight years and has been welcomed by homelessness charities like Centrepoint, Shelter, Crisis and the Big Issue.

Highbury Roundhouse was founded by the late Major Bay Hodgson, a retired Household Cavalry officer in the 1970s, in response to teenagers in Highbury having nowhere to go who simply gathered at the old Roundhouse which was then the playground gatekeeper’s hut in Highbury Fields.

Maj Hodgson got permission from the former GLC to use the old ‘bottleworks’ building in Ronalds Road nearby as a youth club which he had transformed into a community centre.

A new centre was built on the site 50 years later, opened in February last year, affectionately known as “The Bottleworks”.

It runs activities to develop work skills helping people into employment and also tackles social isolation for pensioners with its community activities, while ensuring services reach those in need. It is currently helping families facing food shortage by supporting a foodbank and other projects.

The ‘take one leave one’ project for winter clothing means those in need don’t have to choose whether to buy food or keep warm.

Organisers first approached charity shops suggesting they put a rail of warm clothes outside their shops during winter, with ‘take one leave one’ rails appearing in every high street.