One gardener commented to us “My garden has been like a second home over this covid-19 period of isolation and cut-off. A place to cultivate and be at one with Nature”.
We have loved welcoming so many new growers to IEL in 2020 and wanted to celebrate our combined harvest so, as part of Capital Growth’s Urban Harvest Festival week, we invited growers to tell us about their experiences this year.
You can read the transcript here or watch it on our youtube channel here.
Continue reading…THANK YOU to everyone who continues to put pressure on our Council to change it’s policies on the use of this harmful chemical. We need to keep going and achieve a similar result for our streets.
Press release, Friday 7th August 2020
Lambeth Council says it has today (Friday) ended the use of
glyphosate on its housing estates, “effective immediately.”
“We have beeen phasing out our use of glyphosate across the board,
working towards ceasing to use the pesticide across all its services
by the time its new contracts for waste collection and street
cleansing begin in 2021″ says a council statement.
“The use of herbicides has a significant impact on the environment by
removing plants that are an important source of food for a variety of
native insects. “The council acknowledges that we are facing climate
and biodiversity crises and is committed to doing all it can to tackle
these.
“The use of glyphosate for routine weed management is now banned
across all parks and open spaces and on Lambeth housing estates, as
well as to treat weed growth in tree pits across the borough. “On top
of this, the council has cut its use to treat weeds on streets by a
third and continues to trial alternative methods.
“The way local councils are funded doesn’t usually allow for research
and development, but Lambeth is committed to investigating all
potential ways of ending its use of glyphosate and improving its
biodiversity
“Trials of alternative methods, such as hot foam treatments, are
ongoing, but they tend to have a separate set of severe negative
environmental impacts including huge amounts of wasted water. “We are
continuing to explore selective weeding and increased manual weeding
too as ways to control excessive weed growth.
“We also continue to offer residents the chance to group together and
opt their street out of the weed-spraying schedule, whilst taking
responsibility for keeping their street free of weeds until the new
service begins.”
Word from the Cabinet
Cllr Jennifer Brathwaite, Lambeth’s cabinet member for housing and
homelessness said: “One of my priorities since I took over this role
was to look at how we could quickly end the use of glyphosate on our
estates as part of our commitment to improving the borough’s
biodiversity.
“I am pleased that we have been able to do it and we will look to
suitable alternatives to ensure we keep our estates clean, tidy and
free of trip hazards as well as places where nature thrives.” (Source:
Lambeth council’s official website Love Lambeth)
Hi Sylvie, it was great to meet you last week and have a tour of your garden. (watch the virtual tour here). Could you let us know a little more here please?
How many people are involved with the garden?
We have 25 members but volunteers come when they want, so it is quite irregular; it could be in winter time: 4 volunteers, but some weeks ago we had 20 volunteers turn up, so we have to adapt. We are all volunteers, no one is paid to work in the garden
Wow – 20 people all at once must have been challenging! Could you remind us when you are open for volunteers please?
Every Saturday – 11am – 2pm
What are your greatest challenges?
On two occasions, we have felt out of our depth, when working with people who suffer from serious mental health. We want to support everybody and we know that the benefit of gardening is very powerful to help in moments of distress, but we also have to protect everyone. It is a fine balance but generally, it works very well.
That’s so true – we all know the value of getting into the garden but keeping everyone safe must be a priority too..
What do you consider to be your greatest successes?
I think our greatest success is that after years working in the community garden, all the park has changed; more people are using it and respect it too. When we first gardened here, we used to find a lot of needles, dog poo … it is now very rare. And people love to walk in the Larks garden and involve their children. We feel people are talking more and we feel more connected to the local community. And of course, we have seen the beautiful plants growing from the hard work all the volunteers put in.
That’s such a great achievement!
And finally, what would you like help with (from IEL and/or its members?)
We always need soil and manure, and trees and plant donations. And we would like to be connected with our local doctor’s surgery.
We would also love to know more about the plants we already grow and what are their (medicinal) benefits. And what other plants that we could grow safely to help certain conditions…
I think there’s an opportunity for an event here (maybe online for now!) – talking about the medicinal qualities of the plants we grow..great idea Sylvie! Thanks for sharing with us – you have worked miracles here.
FIND OUT MORE about the Larks by going here
Growing Connections is a project of Sustain, funded by the Centre for Ageing Better and DCMS through the age-friendly and inclusive volunteering programme. The project was delivered by our partner, Capital Growth, Sustain’s network of community food gardens across London. It was designed to facilitate, collate and share best practice across the network and beyond.
Capital Growth connected gardens, buddied local projects together and recruited a team of community leaders to form a Community Garden Group. The group met through 2019 to explore positive and negative volunteering experiences, any barriers to people getting involved and the principles of inclusive volunteering. The end result is a guide containing the principles of age-friendly and inclusive volunteering, tips for best practice and provides a tool to self-review community food projects’ inclusivity. To find out more or download the guide visit: www.capitalgrowth.org/growingconnections
If you missed the first of our Food Stories webinar, watch it on our youtube channel channel
If you missed this talk, you can watch again on our youtube channel here
How do you describe your project?
Thorlands Gardens is a food growing club based on an east Lambeth housing estate, in Camberwell, SE5. The estate was mainly built in the 1950’s, and is strangely hammer shaped.
Thorlands Gardens is named such for good reason. Firstly, It just so happens that Thor was the God of Agriculture. Someone, unbeknown to us, wanted to leave a legacy in the naming of the estate, with a nod to the Scandinavian connection with Queen Anne’s husband the Duke
of Denmark. Indeed the estate sits on Denmark Road, not far from Denmark Hill, where the monarch and her husband apparently lived.
Secondly, our tagline, ‘The first Camberwell market garden in over fifty years,’ was dreamed up, in the context of the whole area previously being farmland, mainly market gardens, orchards, pasture and meadow for sheep. Some of these activities continued up until well into the 1950’s. One interesting fact cited in the archives was that the English herb yarrow
was collected in the fields of Camberwell and sold in London. Apparently, yarrow was used for cleaning the typhoid-ridden water by brewing with barley into weak ‘Flowers’ ale!
Lastly, but by no means least, we all think the name and tagline just has a happy ring to it!
Wow, that’s such an interesting snippet of history – thank you Simon.
Can you tell us why you set the project up?
The project was set up by Thorlands TMO Committee with the help of a local food grower and garden designer. There was a shared vision to move forward with a zero miles food project on unused and unloved brownfield spaces. There was an understanding that residents of all ages could volunteer simply for the value that experience gives to individual wellbeing. There is also the added bonus of sharing the fruits of the labour, which in this case is healthy produce, such as vegetables, salads, herbs, and edible flowers.
And what is the main reason for wanting to join IEL?
Thorlands Gardens is a new project with the need to promote volunteering, and horticultural experiential learning. Being on the IEL Map will help, to recruit more residents and locals, when safe to do so. Bringing people together so we can grow the capacity of the production for locals by locals, is a primary goal. The IEL Map will also be an invaluable platform to promote the benefits to individual health, a community as a whole, as well as the project’s long term mission to be a part of a new food growing culture and circular economy. Thorlands Gardens will provide some much needed
work in the primary sector, right here in Camberwell.
That’s really exciting – to provide employment, we too want to get more people working in this sector!
– and what are the challenges you face in the short, medium and long-term?
Well, as the garden is now starting to take shape in one of the main growing areas we see the possibility of a glut of food in the very near future. However with the current restrictions on working we have simply the challenge to keep up the sowing, potting on and watering. So we
would like to work with IEL to promote an ‘Open Market Day’ which will promote future events on site. We think that is a great way to drive up the interest, the voluntary hours, and also bring a regular customer base.
In the mid term we have the challenge of a dichotomy, one of creating some meaningful local work, while shoppers are still having to keep a healthy distance. The exciting news is that Thorlands is situated in Camberwell in the middle of three towns with five farmers markets. We have already been offered a place at one of those, when the moment is right to open up again. That will involve training up a volunteer as an intern into work. We will
announce which market when the moment is right.
Another long term challenge or a golden opportunity, depending on how you frame it, is the mission of providing employment. The role of a ‘Market Gardener’ which demands a ‘soil to stall’ regime, may be for some very challenging. However, for the right person, an exciting challenge. To keep the learning process an enjoyable one, the role will be mentored and
skilled along the way, experientially. They will learn all about planning, sowing, growing, harvesting, running a stall, selling the produce and promoting the project. As well as learning the ways of plant care and most importantly people care in this pandemic era, the worker will also learn and take part in the social media journey including photography, video making & vlogging. This will expose the very real daily goals or challenges of such a lifestyle.
There is a further, specific long-term challenge here, associated with the role of ‘Market Gardener.’ This will be to recruit, train and retain the right people. I think perhaps this is a ‘hearts and minds’ challenge. Persuading unemployed skill-full people, that may have a totally irrelevant qualification, that local urban food growing is a meaningful and exciting
business, and a joyful job worth having.
In answer to the main question, we think that these aims make Thorlands Gardens a most unique project in the making.
That’s an amazing and very exciting vision Simon! Thanks for sharing it with us – how should anyone interested in your project get in touch with you?
Contact Simon on this email, thorlandsgardens@gmail.com
We are thrilled to be one of the case studies for this important report by the Wildlife Trust that has been published today.
Read the full report here – we are mentioned on Page 12!
A new social enterprise is developing a growing pilot in Lambeth that has been inspired by Covid. The founders, Streatham based Stephen Vasconcellos and Aussie Lucan Creamer, were concerned by the disruption to supply chains that resulted in supermarket shelves being blitzed. They worried that the UK was only 50% food secure and had concerns about how our cities could feed themselves during another pandemic or a future climate shock.
The initiative is WeGrowFor.com and it is partnering with Incredible Edible Lambeth to get Lambeth growing even more food.
The simple idea is to create an Airbnb for unused garden spaces to get people growing. This meets an important need because:
The WeGrowFor team is currently in discussions with Hubbub who had partnered with the GLA, Homebase, and Ikea (amongst other partners) to deliver 10,000 grow kits across London last year under the auspices of a campaign called “Give it a Grow”. Hubbub is also keen to be part of this pilot. Clearly, the need is greater than ever.
The WeGrowFor model is to encourage growers to adopt square foot gardening. Square foot gardening is an engineered gardening process using raised beds that are divided up into square feet sections, and organised with clear instructions about the numbers of veggies that can be planted in each section. The process is simple and no dig – and involves 2% of the effort of normal gardening and results in 5 times the produce. It’s highly efficient and easy to manage. The goal is to bring in external partners to help with some of the supplies and resources – as Hubbub did with its successful campaign last year.
The team envisages a community of thousands of budding gardeners (“growfors”) growing their own vegetables across Lambeth, utilising unused and unloved spaces, and growing to tackle food poverty, to increase health and wellbeing and reduce food miles.
WeGrowFor is also looking for Gardeners and for Landowners or people with unloved spaces.
WeGrowFor is working with a number of volunteers who will map out Lambeth’s growing potential and build out a database of unused garden space (front and back and with access), which could be an incredible resource for growing.
You can reach Stephen on stephen@wegrowfor.com.
