A very positive and productive meeting in Winchester today, the upshot being SemiStone Media has its first UK client, having been tasked by The Hyde Group to create a brochure to promote the work of HARAH, the Hampshire Alliance for Rural Affordable Housing.
The Hyde Group began in 1967 when the country’s major cities were still struggling to overcome the impact of World War II. This was at a time when demand for decent affordable housing outstripped the capacity of the building industry, including local authorities to supply.
The poorest and most vulnerable members of society were condemned to live in the worst housing. The drama “Cathy Come Home” shown on the BBC in November 1966 – a year before The Hyde Group was founded – dramatically highlighted this social injustice.
The Hyde Group’s founding members – Michael Hollingsworth, Ted Watts and John Childs – were dedicated to ensuring Hyde could intervene in the housing market.
They achieved this in two ways. First by helping to ease the circumstances of those in greatest need and secondly by providing products and services that would help people achieve their ambition of a home of their own.
Over the years Hyde has remained true to this and today does much more than just provides housing.
It is an agent for social change; it improves the quality of people’s lives by helping to create a sustainable, inclusive and thriving community – in short places people are proud to call ‘their home’.
