A GROUP of students in Rhyl have secured beds for 180 rough sleepers by trading their beds for sleeping bag for one night.

More than 20 people gathered with with a sleeping bag and a cardboard box for the first Sally's Sleep Out fundraiser at at the Council Family Centre on Bedford Street, organised by former Prestatyn High pupil Sally Harland, raising more than £2000 for Homelessness charity Centrepoint.

Before the actual sleep out took place, the event offered a pop-up soup kitchen with chilli and rice, soup, jacket potatoes, sandwiches and a variety of cakes.

Miss Harland, a 20 year old student of the University of Liverpool, said: "When we opened the gates there was already a woman waiting outside ready to fill her bags and get some hot food.

The students also organised a clothes bank, offering free clothes to rough sleepers and a variety of sanitation products, a barber, a hair stylist and a make up artist.

Left over donated clothes have been distributed to charity shops in Rhyl and the Dewi Sant centre and sanitary packs donated to the Moonlight Project.

The money raised has been donated to the nationwide homelessness charity Centrepoint, with funds translating to about 180 beds for one month for rough sleepers between 18 and 25., with plans for a new Rhyl soup kitchen every three months and another Sleep Out next year.

Mis Harland added: "We had an experience I think none of us will ever forget, along with all our new friends.