Welsh library users are being encouraged to check out some sunshine from their local libraries with the arrival of kits designed to tackle the effects of seasonal affective disorder.
With days rapidly getting shorter after the end of British Summer Time on Sunday 25th October, local library-goers can borrow one of hundreds of Wintering Well Boxes now available for loan from British public library services after two years of successful trials in Scotland.
In Wales, 11 regional libraries are working in partnership to offer boxes to users in Cardiff, Swansea, Wrexham, Neath-Port Talbot, Blaenau-Gwent, Merthyr Tydfil, Powys, Conwy, Newport, Vale of Glamorgan and Caerphilly. The Wintering Well guidebook Light is a Right: A Guide to Wintering Well will be available to anyone in Wales via BorrowBox, the digital library platform.
The boxes were developed with ESRC funding by researchers from the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh in consultation with people who experience symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) during the shorter days of winter.
They include a therapeutic light lamp which can help replace the beneficial effects of outdoor sunlight during shorter winter days, and a guidebook with tips on simple indoor and outdoor activities that can help support a healthy new winter routine. The boxes also offer access to a free online course helping users tackle the effects of SAD.
The boxes aim to help alleviate the mental and physical problems caused by SAD. More than a million people in the UK are estimated to live with SAD during the winter months as a result of reduced access to natural light, according to figures from the Royal College of Psychiatry.
A total of 16 public library services across England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland will share 600 of the boxes this year. This expansion comes after the first loan scheme was introduced in public libraries in East Dunbartonshire in 2024.
Since then, local people have checked out the Wintering Well Boxes more than 1000 times, and more boxes have also been made available to library services in Glasgow and the Orkney Islands.
To find out more about borrowing a Wintering Well Box visit Caerphilly Library at 2 The Twyn, CF83 1JL email libcaer@caerphilly.gov.uk or call 02920 853911.
