Because Your Potential Doesn't Always Fit A 9-5
A community where you belong, connect and build skills that matter.
The Story Behind Ablepreneurs®
Built from lived experience. Growing through community.
Ablepreneurs® is a UK community for disabled, chronically ill and neurodivergent entrepreneurs, freelancers, and professionals who want to build meaningful, sustainable careers and businesses without pretending their health, energy or access needs do not exist.
Here, ambition is welcome. Rest is respected. And nobody has to justify why a rigid, one-size-fits-all way of working simply does not work for them.
But, how did we get here...
Emily Kathleen Renshaw
Our Story Begins With a Seven‑Year‑Old Girl in Shropshire
Nearly a century ago, a seven‑year‑old Shropshire girl named Emily Kathleen Renshaw had her life changed in a single moment.
One day she was running and playing like every other child… and the next, she woke to find one of her legs gone, taken not by illness, but by a devastating medical mistake.
Doctors believed she had TB of the ankle. They were wrong. It was later discovered to be nothing more than stretched sinews. But by then, one irreversible decision had altered the entire course of her life.
She faced that future at a time when disability often meant being hidden away, pitied, or quietly told that you would never amount to anything.
A time when society saw limitation before it saw potential. Yet Emily's story did not end with loss. Her talent, her ambition, her fire - they remained. They simply needed the right environment to be seen.
Emily Kathleen Renshaw with her husband to be John Podmore
The woman who created a different kind of opportunity - Dame Agnes Hunt
Dame Agnes Hunt understood the damage caused when society confuses disability with inability because she had lived it herself. Born in 1866, Agnes developed osteomyelitis in her hip as a child.
She lived with permanent pain and found walking difficult, but travelled, trained as a nurse and opened a convalescent home for children in Baschurch in 1900.
Her work with renowned orthopaedic surgeon Robert Jones helped lead to the development of the hospital now known as The Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital.
Medical treatment alone was not enough for Agnes. She saw many young people leaving hospital with talent and determination, yet shut out of working life because nobody had created a route back in.
So, in 1927, she founded Derwen Training College. Its purpose was practical and radical for its time: to help physically disabled young people learn trades suited to them and become partially or wholly self-supporting.
Derwen did not manufacture Emily's potential; it gave that potential somewhere to go. That distinction sits at the heart of Ablepreneurs® today.
The splint shop at Derwen College
Dame Agnes Hunt
The men's workshop in Derwen College
Resilience has a lineage
Emily Kathleen’s strength travelled through generations.
Her granddaughter, Helen Pugh, spent nearly 30 years building a career across estate agency, insurance, auctions and professional services. She developed the skills every business needs: communication, organisation, problem‑solving, relationship‑building and the ability to keep things moving when life becomes complicated.
But chronic illness and disability made traditional employment unsustainable. Self‑employment became the turning point, a way to keep contributing while working in a way that respected her body, her energy and her reality.
And it revealed something powerful:
Disabled, chronically ill and neurodivergent entrepreneurs weren’t struggling because they lacked talent. They were struggling because they were trying to build businesses in environments that weren’t designed for them.
Ablepreneurs® was created to change that. From that lived experience, Ablepreneurs® was born.
Ablepreneurs® has been recognised as a Theo Paphitis Small Business Sunday (#SBS) winner, and our founder Helen has been awarded f:entrepreneur #iAlso100 top 100 Female Entrepreneurs 2026.
Ablepreneurs® was not created simply to collect awards or make inclusion sound good on paper. It was created so fewer people would have to build alone, taking forward the belief that Talent doesn't disappear with illness or disability, it just need the right environment to shine
From a Shropshire story to a national movement
In 2026, Helen created National Ablepreneurs Day to increase the visibility, recognition, and respect for disabled, chronically ill, and neurodivergent entrepreneurs, freelancers, and creatives across the UK.
The founding event took place at The Wroxeter near Shrewsbury on 16 September 2026, bringing together founders, charities, advocates and supportive businesses.
Watch the highlights video and read the blog about the phenomenal event here. National Ablepreneurs Day: Celebrating Disabled Entrepreneurs in the UK
The full national launch will follow in 2027, the centenary year of Derwen College.
That timing brings the Ablepreneurs® story full circle.
A century after Dame Agnes created a place where young disabled people could develop skills and build greater independence, a movement rooted in the same Shropshire soil is carrying that belief forward for a new generation of business owners.
The world has changed enormously since Emily first arrived at Derwen, and we believe it still has some catching up to do...
If you’re a disabled, chronically ill or neurodivergent entrepreneur, conventional ways of working may not work for your health, energy or circumstances. But working differently shouldn’t mean limiting your ambitions or building your future alone.
Ablepreneurs® exists to close that gap
Ablepreneurs® is a community of people who understand that reality because we live it too. It’s a place to connect, build practical business and professional skills, grow your network and create opportunities that work with your life - whether you’re developing your career or building a business of your own.
Different needs shouldn’t mean smaller ambitions.
A community that gets it
Connect with disabled, chronically ill and neurodivergent professionals and entrepreneurs who understand the realities of working around changing health, energy and capacity. Build genuine relationships, share experiences and grow your network without having to explain yourself first.
Skills you can actually use
Develop practical, real-world skills to help you move forward in your life and develop professional skills to help advance your career or grow your own business. Learn at a pace that works for you and turn useful knowledge into confident action.
Opportunities on your terms
Explore new ways to earn money, progress your skills, and use your experience without forcing yourself into a traditional way of working that doesn’t fit. Define success for yourself, and build towards it with the right people beside you.
You don’t have to build what comes next alone.
Ablepreneurs® is where disabled, chronically ill and neurodivergent professionals and entrepreneurs come together to connect, learn and grow.
Build practical skills, expand your network and create new opportunities alongside people who understand that success doesn’t have to follow a conventional nine-to-five path.
Because Entrepreneurship Has No Limits...
Join an award-winning community, make connections, learn new skills and make more impact in a way that works for your body & brain!
