One month shelter update

Glass Door Homeless Charity operates the UK's largest network of open access Winter Night Shelters for people experiencing homelessness. 

Our Winter Night Shelters opened on 10th November, and will operate seven nights a week until the end of March next year. 

Our shelters run in circuits across three London boroughs – one in Kensington and Chelsea, one in Hammersmith and Fulham, and one in Wandsworth. And, like all of our services, our night shelters run on an open access basis. This means that no matter who you are or where you come from, you can turn to us for support.  

For the third year running, our shelters are split between a mixed-gender circuit, men’s circuit and women’s circuit, and we’re also holding a weekly Women’s Casework Drop-in that supports our women’s shelter guests. 

Each circuit offers up to 35 people a safe place to sleep each night, as well as a hot dinner and breakfast the next morning, and access to our Casework service. 

We're now one month into our 2025-26 night shelter season. These are the insights from the frontline: 

725 people have been referred to our shelters 

• 241 guests have stayed in the shelters, of whom: 

• 65% have been men, 34% women, 1% non-binary or prefer to self describe 

• 83% were previously sleeping rough 

• The youngest was 19 and the oldest 78 

• 139 shelter guests have engaged with our Caseworkers, of whom 15 have already moved towards more permanent housing, 7 have received financial support, and 5 have been connected to health services. 

Just over one week after our shelters opened, temperatures in London fell to zero degrees for the first time this winter, leading Glass Door to activate our Emergency Cold Weather Policy, meaning that we increased our capacity to up to 40 people each night for each circuit. During this time the Greater London Authority also triggered its Severe Weather Emergency Protocol (SWEP), which meant that additional emergency accommodation options became available in London.   

Despite these extra measures, demand remained so high that we had to close referrals for men on 4th December due to the large waiting list.

With temperatures expected to continue dropping as we head deeper into the winter season, our shelters are needed more than ever, and we expect demand to continue to be worryingly high as time goes on. 

Stay tuned for updates every month.