Orange Sky Laundry Launches In Newcastle

BY IAN CROUCH

People without a permanent home in the Hunter now have access to a new free service they can relay on to make life a little easier.

Orange Sky Laundry has officially launched in Newcastle today to provide a free mobile clothes washing and drying service to around 2000 people each week who are living on the streets or in boarding houses.

It's also a chance to have conversations with these people to ensure they're okay.

Co-founder, Lucas Patchett says they did their first five loads of washing last night at Lake Macquarie.

"We're looking at the moment to go to about 8 different places across the week and then that's going to grow the more volunteers that we get. So, we really encourage people to jump onto the team. We've already got 12 different locations that we could be operating in but again it depends on those volunteers," he said.

Orange Sky Co-Founders Lucas Patchett and Nic Marchesi at today's launch with Newcastle Lord Mayor, Nuatali Nelmes

Free Mobile Laundry for Homeless in Newcastle

BY JARROD MELMETH

Newcastle could soon have a free mobile laundry service for the homeless by the end of the year if funding can be secured.

The project is run by 2016 Young Australians of the Year and Orange Sky Laundry founders Nic Marchesi and Lucas Patchett.

Each van costs $100,000 to build and are custom fitted with two commercial washing machines and two dryers which combined, do over 5.8 tonnes of laundry every week.

The vehicles are Australia's first free mobile laundry service for the homeless and has a fleet of 9 vehicles around Australia, one of which is stopping at Hamilton station today.

The stop is part of a five-day and 2000-kilometre journey from Brisbane to Melbourne in hopes of sourcing volunteers to help service a van in Newcastle.

One of the Orange Sky Laundries in action. Photo Courtesy of The Advertiser.