A presentation demonstrating what communities have achieved in their outdoor spaces and offering some ideas on what you could do with your own. This supports the workshop given by the Eden Project’s Landscape Architect Jane Knight as part of the Big Lunch Extras programme. Find out more about Big Lunch Extras at www.biglunchextras.com

1. ….. discover what communities have achieved in
their outdoor spaces and get some ideas on what
you could do with your own
Community green space

2. Jane Knight
eden project landscape architect
jknight@edenproject.com

3. Community green spaces – where are they?
• Streetscape improvements …. ‘in bloom’
• Parks & public open spaces
• Verges & roundabouts
• Allotments
• School grounds
• Health centre & hospital grounds
• Church grounds & graveyards
• Land owned by utility or rail companies
• Woodlands & biodiversity areas
• Community orchards
• Roofs of buildings
• Green spaces within housing developments
• Shared gardens
• We don’t know yet!
Community Land Advisory Service (CLAS)
www.communitylandadvice.org.uk
Service developed to combat the lack of available land for community gardening and
green space activities.

4. Why get involved?
• Caring for the local environment
• Enhancing community cohesion
• Improving facilities and opportunities
• An opportunity to learn new skills
• Promoting healthy living and improved wellbeing
Well managed and maintained green space is an asset to the
whole community.
Makes the community a more desirable place to live.

5. Getting involved with community green space?
• Set up an ‘in bloom’ project
https://www.rhs.org.uk/communities/campaigns/britain-in-bloom
• Become a master gardener
www.mastergardeners.org.uk
• Engage with your local Council on existing parks & open
spaces
• Take control of an existing park or open space
• Take control of a space for the benefit of you community
• Temporary use of an open space, ‘meanwhile use’
• Guerilla gardening ….

6. • 160 year old quarry nearing its end of life
• Irregular 16 ha crater, 30 – 70 m deep
• No flat ground and unstable slopes
• Very wet with poor drainage
• No soil
Bodelva China clay pit : Eden Project site, 1998
be ambitious

7. Eden Project : A global garden where people can learn
about the natural world and our role in caring for it….
importance of a champion

8. teamwork

9. Southbank Centre, London
Queen Elizabeth Hall roof ‘sun deck’
challenge & opportunity

10. work with volunteer organisations

11. make it rewarding and fun

12. Queen Elizabeth Hall
Roof Garden
People & plants transform
a concrete desert into an
oasis

13. growing vegetables and flowers

14. biodiversity & wildlife

17. Southbank Centre
Festival of the World 2012
change & evolution

18. Certificate in Practical
Horticulture at Eden Project
skills & training

19. Southbank Centre
Festival of the Neighbourhood 2013 ‘meanwhile’ use

20. “To be able to help to design, build and nurture
the garden on the Thames at Southbank
Centre with our team is, to this date, one of
the biggest challenges of my life.
Seven years ago, I was a broken man both
physically and mentally, living on the streets
with methadone, heroin and alcohol
addictions numbing the misery of my life.
How I got there is a long story. Today I am
clean, employed as a Horticulture Teacher in
our group, Grounded Ecotherapy, paying my
own rent for the first time in 30 years.
Horticulture has changed my life.”
Paul Pulford, 2011
therapeutic value

21. Growing for Life(rs)
HMP Dartmoor
Old, walled exercise yards in former
punishment wing walled yards, before the
growing project started

22. buried treasure (skills audit)

23. outdoor activity

24. Since August 2007, produce goes into free
veg boxes delivered to elderly members of
the local community.
Veg boxes are sent out with labels designed
by the RSU inmates: “peas release me.”
Our growers inside have received many
letters of thanks and have appreciated
being able to “give something back”.
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
“PPeeaass RReelleeaassee MMee””
GGrroowwnn wwiitthh CCoonnvviicctt--iioonn!!
community benefits
(giving, sharing)

25. “a new community garden that was created, with the help of Keep Wales Tidy,
out of what was a grubby, brambly alleyway haunted by drug addicts and
thieves who used it as an access routes into gardens, houses and the grounds of
the neighbouring cardboard factory”
Ethel Street, Neath Port Talbot, Wales
repurposing waste

26. Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm (CSA), Ipswich
• 12 acre former intensively farmed field.
• Two full-time professional farmers
(paying themselves £850 a month, less
than the minimum wage)
• 55 local households pay £8 a week for a
“share” i.e. veg box (flowers, eggs and
pork are optional extras)
• Members must undertake two hours a
week voluntary work on the farm
during summer – sowing, weeding,
mulching, harvesting or feeding the two
beef cattle, pigs, geese and chickens.

27. “As soon as you teach children which berries are edible and delicious,” says Helene
Rudlin, the horticultural therapist at Hulme Community Garden Centre: “They get
stuck in: they engage with nature and connect with others.”
Hulme Community Garden Centre, Manchester
Engaging children & young people
Income generation

28. play with caution

29. ‘loose parts’ & storage container?

30. playing in nature

31. natural and multi-functional

32. Outdoor space : development process
Peace Park, Podujeve, Kosovo
An outdoor space to heal a community

33. catalytic event

34. be resourceful

35. community needs

36. understanding the site
What’s there, how valuable is it?
• Slope
• Microclimate – wind, aspect, light/shade
• Features - retain?
• Soil – quality and depth
• Drainage
• Trees – condition and spread
• Views
• How is it used now?

37. above & below ground

38. Engage the
whole
community

39.  Different approaches for
different groups
 Make it fun
 Feedback what people
have said
 Keep community updated
on what’s happening
 Involve at all stages in the
process
creative community engagement

40.  What would you like to get rid
of?
 What do you like about the
place?
 Things that are important to
keep?
 What do you do here?
 What would you like to do?
 What kind of space would you
like to have?
open questions …..

41. what do you want it to be?

42.  Existing plans from building or
other reason?
 Land survey – if complex levels
or large area.
 If small, flat and
straightforward – have a go!
land survey

43. make a plan

44. what plants?... seasonal change, maintenance ….

45.  Working with designers vs. doing a plan yourself
 Depends on scale and complexity
 Big idea needs a master plan but don’t have to do it
all at once. Advice on phasing & implementation
 Some designers don’t build but can advise or project
manage. Some offer a ‘design & build’ service
use a designer?

46. where to start?

47. making it happen

48. get started,
quick wins

49. bulbs & wishes

50. work for a contractor

51. community
work days

52. tools for the team
planning & organisation

54. risk assessment

56. celebrate achievements

57. use the space

58. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful,
committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is
the only thing that ever has.”
Margaret Mead

59. 6. Magazines and Books

60. Explore the Spiral Garden
Shamelessly plunder ideas from others!