Alana House – Women’s Community Project

Alana House is a community project run by PACT that uses a holistic and trauma-informed approach to support and empower women facing multiple disadvantages.

We offer a confidential, women-only, non-judgemental space and welcome all women who feel they need help, support and advice.

Alana House has a women-only centre in Reading but we also provide outreach services across Berkshire. 

Alana House Reading opened in April 2010, adopting the recommendations from the Corston Report, which identified nine pathways of support and the trauma-informed approach needed to support women.

Initially established to support women who had committed offences but were often victims of trauma themselves, Alana House has developed over the years to support all women with multiple or complex needs who are looking for support to help make positive life changes.

Alana House meets women at their point of need and supports them to identify and work towards individual goals. We support women through individual keywork, group work, drop-in sessions, outreach, partnership with specialist agencies and partner agency-led courses and information sessions. Alana House also enables women to access practical help with washing, food supplies and computer use.

Alana House is committed to valuing diversity, promoting equality of opportunity for all and ensuring that our services reflect the diversity of the communities we serve. We will take a person-centred and case-by-case approach. We are able to support women including:

• Individuals who have acquired female gender through the statutory gender recognition process
• Transgender women including non-binary people assigned female gender at birth and people transitioning to become female. . We are not able to support non-binary people who were assigned male gender at birth

Part of the PACT Communities Team, Alana House works alongside Bounce Back 4 Kids (BB4K) project, which supports children and parents who have previously experienced domestic abuse.