The Awareness Centre was founded in 2005 and has since developed into one of London’s leading providers of safe, confidential counselling and psychotherapy services for a range of mental health issues. We are based in Clapham (our first Centre) and Tooting (opened in 2019). Michaela McCarthy, our Managing Director, also runs her private practice offering counselling, psychotherapy and psychosexual & relationship therapy in Wimpole Street.
Therapy services in London
The Awareness Centre has a team of over 300 therapists offering confidential counselling, psychotherapy and psychology in more than 20 languages from our London centres. Some therapists also offer online and telephone sessions. Our therapists work with multi-theoretical approaches and offer support for a range of presenting issues. We are a registered healthcare provider. If you’re taking the first step to reach out for support, our experienced front-of-house team can help you find the right therapist for you. Call us on 020 8673 4545.
Counselling Placement at TAC
The Awareness Centre (TAC) runs one of the biggest counselling placement schemes in the UK, recruiting trainee counsellors, psychotherapists and counselling psychologists from over 70 training institutes in the Greater London area for our counselling placement.
We offer placements within our NHS Talking Therapies Services in Lambeth, Sutton and Wandsworth and at our Clapham Centre within our Low Cost Counselling Service. These placements support students’ training, allowing them to develop their clinical experience working with clients on a short and long-term basis, face-to-face and online.
Most of our low-cost therapy sessions are delivered by therapists in-training. Our placement therapists are members of one or more recognised professional accreditation bodies.
Our Training School
The Awareness Centre Training School opened in 2020 to deliver counselling and supervision training and equip students with the skills and clinical experience they need to succeed in their careers as counsellors, therapists and clinical supervisors.
The school, with the support of our team of highly experienced tutors, offers a complete professional journey to becoming a qualified therapist from the Foundation level through to Diploma and provides clinical experience through our counselling placement.
Discover NHS, Private & Low-Cost Counselling
- Our NHS clients are individuals aged 18+ registered with GP surgeries in the boroughs of Lambeth, Wandsworth and Sutton.
- Our low-cost counselling service is for people aged 18+, and we work with individuals or couples.
- Our private clients include individuals, couples and families, children aged from three years, young people from 13-17 years, and people aged 18+.
TAC accepts self-referrals and referrals from community learning difficulties teams for both children and adults, mental health teams, probation service teams, substance misuse teams, GPs, nurses, psychiatrists, and other professionals to our NHS and private therapy services. TAC accepts self-referrals only for our low-cost counselling services.
Our Philosophy, Mission, Values, and Vision
Our philosophy at The Awareness Centre is that no single approach to mental health is right for everyone and, as such, we ensure that we work with therapists who have a range of experience, backgrounds, and specialist knowledge. We welcome and encourage diversity and unity in our therapists, clients, trainees, and tutors to facilitate an environment in which mental health services are accessible and beneficial for all.
The Awareness Centre’s mission is to be a positive force in the counselling and psychotherapy community by offering high-quality mental health services and training to all. The Awareness Centre endeavours to enhance our clients’ mental well-being and develop our trainee therapists to do the same, by providing outstanding training to the next generation of mental health practitioners.
The Awareness Centre values respect, compassion, and empathy for everyone, as well as integrity and transparency about our services and offerings. We are dedicated to the well-being of our clients, staff and students, and are passionate about education and increasing awareness of mental health issues. Our vision is to continually improve and enhance the mental health industry by committing to the training and development of our students and consistently providing exceptional mental health services to all.
The Awareness Centre works with a range of other commercial and charity organisations. It is contracted by the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust (SLaM) and South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust (SWLSTG) to work in partnership with Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) to deliver six or 12 free counselling sessions within GP surgeries in Lambeth, Wandsworth and Sutton.
Our Blog
Take a look at some of our recent blog posts, covering topics from post-lockdown anxiety to our therapy training services.
Open 7 days a week
3 London centres
Disabled access
