Youngsters have painted a street mural in Wapping as a tribute to frontline NHS workers who kept life going during the Covid emergency.

East London Advertiser: Street art workshop for Wapping Youth FC members run by Paint the Change arts charity. Picture: WYFCStreet art workshop for Wapping Youth FC members run by Paint the Change arts charity. Picture: WYFC (Image: WYFC)

Members of Wapping Youth football club have been kicking about ideas to express their views through street art and came up with the tribute on a wall in their neighbourhood.

“They have things to say,” club founder Nahimul Islam explained. “Our young people wanted to brighten up the streets around Wapping.”

The project also helps them “think through the issues” that are important to today’s young generation.

It also brought praise from one Tower Hamlets councillor who lives in Wapping, Abdul Ullah, who said: “The Royal London Hospital is just a mile away and this is a way for us to say thanks to them for keeping us safe.

East London Advertiser: Splashing out... members of Wapping Youth FC sprucing up the dull streets with colourful tribute mural to the NHS. Picture: Wapping YFCSplashing out... members of Wapping Youth FC sprucing up the dull streets with colourful tribute mural to the NHS. Picture: Wapping YFC (Image: Wapping YFC)

“The mural has brought so much colour to our neighbourhood. People looking through the windows will feel a sunshine beaming back.”

The youngsters joined art workshops run by the Paint the Change charity to work out how to put their ideas into visual art.

The charity has created 40 murals on five continents around the world in the past five years to “champion social justice”.

It invited people in Bromley-by-Bow to nominate local folk heroes last year and created their portraits at the Linc community centre in October.