Lambeth Town Hall was abuzz on the evening of November 1st for the Blooming Lambeth Awards 2022. Among the glistening squashes and crunchy autumn leaves that decorated every table, were seated men, women and children who had spent hours every week caring for gardens, orchards and vegetable plots. And now everyone was waiting for the results of this year’s Blooming Lambeth Awards – from the best volunteer for a community growing space to the best school garden.
The excitement was palpable, the music was rousing and the soup was warming and delicious. Over the next two hours, gardeners, volunteers, and gardens were honoured and celebrated, just as they deserved! We were very happy to welcome Arit Anderson from Gardeners World to present them with their prizes and certificates, and to have their photo taken with her.
We awarded 43 prizes in eight categories rewarding hardworking and attentive individuals and groups.
We hope that you will come across a few, or many of these thriving green spaces around Lambeth, and know that we will continue to work to our mission – which is to support and advocate for access to healthy, affordable food, grown and produced locally, with an ultimate goal of a food growing space being within 100m of every Lambeth home.
With special thanks to all the countless hours of voluntary work put in by IEL directors to making this competition and event an enormous success, along with the help and support of the Lambeth Housing Community engagement team.
The Blooming Lambeth Awards 2022 were supported by the generous sponsorship of Lambeth Council, the T Brown Group and OpenView Security Solutions, making it possible to award £4,000 of prizes in the form of B&Q vouchers to the selected awardees of Commended, Highly Commended and Winner accolades.
Additional sponsorship for the awards ceremony night was received from the Lambeth Business Improvement Districts (BID’s); InStreatham, This is Clapham, Brixton BID and WeAreWaterloo, whose contributions supported the decorations, food and music for the ceremony.
We would also like to thank The Platform Cafe for providing wonderful soup, Blackbird Bakery for delicious bread and cakes, and Pangea for their sublime music.
And our special thanks to Arit anderson for making the evening so special for so many.
And our biggest, warmest congratulations to all who took part and look upon open land as ground for possibilities and plant seeds to make them come true.
Over the next two years, Incredible Edible Lambeth (IEL) will support residents in Lambeth housing estates to divert food waste from landfill into valuable food waste.
To read the article, find the paper at these locations – click here.
You’re invited to vote in four categories including the best community or school garden. There are £4,000 worth of prizes are up for grabs for the winners. Now in its 6th year the awards are organised by Incredible Edible Lambeth and are made up of eight categories with four of those categories being judged by a panel of garden experts. Voting closes at midnight on 28 August.
It’s that time of year again! We are excited to announce the launch of the Blooming Lambeth Awards 2022 – a chance for every grower in the borough to win a cash prize and be recognised for their contribution to making Lambeth a better place to live.
We have 8 categories this year and nominations are now open. Nominations for all categories close at midnight 11th June. Click below to make sure your gardens and/or gardeners are in the running!
Last year we were chosen by the West Norwood Co-op to take part in the Co-op Local Community Fund as one of three local causes supported by the community. Thank you so much to all of the Co-op members who selected us as their cause!
Last week along with West Norwood Feast and CHM Christ Ministry we were invited to a special presentation to accept the funds from your generous support.
A huge THANK YOU from us to the West Norwood Co-op and their members!
Your support has helped us in creating our West Norwood Map and walking trails. Through your contributions we look forward to offering guided walks in 2022.
With support from the London Community Foundation, we’ve spent the winter growing vegetables with an amazing community of 3,000 people across Lambeth.
Over 100 households, 8 schools, 20 community gardens and 4 Lambeth Estates braved the weather and got their hands dirty growing their own food, many for the first time. Almost everyone shared their seeds with friends, family and neighbours, and helped each other out along the way.
Lots of growers told us the project helped them cope with lockdown: “Great to bring some life to the garden during lockdown”
We also caught up regularly with everyone in our community ‘Grow Together’ sessions. We’ve shared tips, tricks and stories of limp spinach and surprise success in equal measure: “Fantastic project, it has really helped with my mental health”
The connections made with each other has been the highlight of the project. Some amazing partners have also generously supported the project:
Myatt’s Fields Park, and experienced gardener, Fabrice, provided hundreds of spinach, mizuna, cabbage, and onion seedlings. Thank you to him and everyone who delivered these precious and delicate seedlings to our winter growers.
Franchi Seeds, who donated a huge number of assorted seeds which allowed us to provide amazing packages of seeds when finding them anywhere was a challenge!
Alongside the growing, we’ve worked together with local groups to create five new walking trails on two new maps exploring Stockwell and West Norwood . The maps have allowed us to provide paid work for young local people, highlighted amazing community growing spots and taken people to green spaces they might never have known existed.
Thank you to everyone who took the time to grow, share and spread the word.
What’s coming up?
We want to work with more people to support community-led growing in Lambeth. If you have any ideas about how we could do this, we’d love to chat: director@incredibleediblelambeth.org
Following on from the work we are doing on six housing estates in Lambeth (as part of the Mayor of London funded ‘Grow Back Greener‘ project), and work we are doing with Arup on mapping the borough (see Lambeth plots), we held this great zoom event, attended by almost 50 people. Watch it HERE
Here’s a list of the places represented by the attendees:
St Matthew’s Estate (Brixton)
Caldwell Estate
Hillside Gardens Park
Rosendale Estate
Central Hill Estate
Tabard Gardens
Walworth Community Garden (Southwark)
Arup
Lambeth Council
Cowley Estate
Open Orchard
Myatt’s Field South
St Martin’s Estate
Vauxhall Gardens Estate
Calais Gate and Coligny Court
Edmundsbury Estate
Oasis Waterloo
Goldsmith’s College
Food Ethics Council
Bernie Spain Community Garden
Seed Sovereignty/London Freedom Seed Bank
St Leonard’s Church and School, Streatham
Palace Road Estate
AllotMe
Friends of the Earth, Lambeth
Springfield Estate
Notes from the event:
You can find further information on our guest speaker Judy Ling Wong – here and her presentation will soon be able to be viewed separately to the full length zoom event (awaiting link). Our Grow Back Greener Estates draft version of the Template of Engagement can be read here. Please send us comments about this template.
If you’ve identified some land you would like to grow food on (or create a garden to encourage biodiversity), why not get in touch today? questions @incredibleediblelambeth.org.
In the ‘Chat’ there was discussion about pesticide use on our streets – if you would like to opt out of the Council’s upcoming spraying regime, go here . If you live on an estate, you can ask for any neighbouring streets not to be sprayed. If you have not yet pledged to go pesticide-free, please go here today.
If you live or work in Lambeth and are not yet a member of IEL, pleasejoin our organisation today and strengthen our voice for more food growing in the borough.
It’s that time of year again! We are excited to announce the launch of the Blooming Lambeth Awards 2021 – a chance for every grower in the borough to win a cash prize and be recognised for their contribution to making Lambeth a better place to live.
The categories: we have eight categories this year, See below for a full description of each.
Judging and prizes: there will be cash prizes of £150 and £75 for winners and highly commended. Four of the categories will be people’s vote, whilst four categories will be voted by Lambeth food growers. Make sure you read the guidelines before applying. You can nominate yourself or someone you know or a garden you admire.
Each entry should be accompanied by ALL of the following information:
your name and email address
the person or contact at the garden you’re nominating (if it’s not yourself), their email address
the address/location of the garden, school or where the person volunteers
a description of your nomination: min 50/max 200 words – make this as clear as you can – this is what we and the public will read and will help in judging.
your nomination’s social media accounts (if you/they have any): Twitter / Instagram / Flickr / FB page
photos: (min 3 / max 8) maximum size 2MB – make sure these photos are clear and really showcase the category you’re nominating. These are the photographs we will use to shortlist nominations and will determine which nominations are visited. For the People’s Vote – these are the photos the public will see to cast their vote.
Nitty gritty:
you (or your nomination) must live or work in Lambeth
you can nominate once in as many categories as you like
if you are shortlisted yours, or your nominee’s bank account details will be required. We make bank transfers not cash payments. Only nominees will get paid, not nominators.
by entering these awards, you agree to IEL using your images on our social media accounts and website. You agree to waive your copyright. (we will not sell your images for commercial purposes) If you are sending a photo with an image with a minor in it, you must either be their parent or custodian, and/or have their consent, for IEL to use it. Safeguarding is your responsibility here – do not submit any images of minors you do not want publicised.
and finally, it’s a given – in line with our ongoing campaign – no harmful pesticide or herbicide will have been used to aid growth of your plants. We also would love to hear that you have opted for peat free compost.
Why bother entering? There will be at least two prizes per category, with cash winnings of £75-£150 each and, as a winner, your garden will receive lots of publicity and a small framed certificate. Everyone is welcome to attend an events ceremony in October (we are not yet certain whether this will be in real life or online or both!).
The deadlines: the deadline for entering the awards is 30th June.
All IEL voting and visiting of the selected nominations will take place 5th-18th July, when photos will be taken.
The award ceremony will take place online on 18 November (7pm to 8pm).
Here are the categories for this year:
1. Most imaginative growing space in public view (a planter, a balcony, a hanging basket, an unusual container) – This category will be judged by a panel of Lambeth food growers
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
2. Ivor Picardo Award for abundant growing of edibles, this could be in a public or private space. This category will be judged by a panel of Lambeth food growers
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
3. Best school garden – Is your school growing food? Does it have a programme to involve all children in outdoor learning? Has your school developed a wildflower area? Has it planted trees and shrubs to help create barriers against pollution? We want to hear about it! This category will be judged by a panel of Lambeth food growers
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
4. Most enthusiastic young gardener (under 18) – This could be a young person getting involved at home or in their neighbourhood or at their school. People’s vote
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
5. Best volunteer for a community growing space – Young or old, we know that there are so many people giving their time to make community gardens run smoothly and effectively. Now’s your chance to show how you value them and to say ‘Thank you’ to them. People’s vote
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
6. Best resident-led community garden – This category will be judged by a panel of Lambeth food growers
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
7. Best garden in bloom (public or private space but must have a public facing view – eg front garden, therapeutic garden, parklet) – People’s vote
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
8. Best space for encouraging biodiversity – for example: do the pollinators love your patch? or are you growing flowers that attract them? or do you have places for hedgehogs, beetles? or do you have a pond? People’s vote
Nominations are now closed. Thank you to everyone who submitted a nomination.
