Creating London’s First Front Garden Friendly Neighbourhood
Green the Grid wants to Grow!
We’re looking for volunteers to help us create, plan and prepare our Southfields events and help us grow, pot up and look after our plants. Interested? We’re holding an open evening on Thursday October 16 at 7-8pm at Brookwood Garden Café, so come along if you want to find out more.
New for Autumn!
We’re starting monthly Sunday Morning Gardening Hours from 10 to 11 on the last Sunday every month to spend time tidying up tree bases and maintain the Green the Grid Herb Garden.
Finally, our ever popular Christmas Wreath Making event will be back in December - more details to follow.
Our Big Green Summer!
Green the Grid joined Mend, Fix and Repair Café, Recycle More Southfields and many more at Southfields Harvest in September. Narcissus Tête-à-Tête, Muscari and Wild Garlic bulbs were handed out for planting in tree bases to give the Grid a show of early colour next year. Seeds and plants were also swapped. Take a look at photos of the day on our gallery!
Our big herb giveaway took place on 14 June as part of Great Big Green Week, in partnership with Southfields Mend, Fix and Repair Café. We gave away over 500 herbs including sage, rosemary, mint, fennel, lavender and more. Almost half the plants were grown here in the grid! Our Grid Gardeners grew herbs from cuttings and we had an incredible bounty of plants donated from a local allotment. Take a look at our short video, opposite.
This year’s Front Garden Awards saw more than 30 ‘Outstanding’ and 100 ‘Delightful’ awards handed out to front gardens around the Grid, plus 11 Best in Street tree base awards. To see photos of our winning gardens plus inspiration from previous years take a look at our Front Garden and Tree Base gallery.
We’re a community group on a mission to transform the Southfields Grid into London’s first Front Garden Friendly Neighbourhood.
We do this by organising community planting days, where we provide advice on planting front gardens and tree bases. We also work with like-minded projects to promote greening our communities.
Why Front Gardens Matter
Around a third of front gardens in the UK lack any plant cover. We want to do our bit in Southfields to change that.
Green front gardens provide five major benefits. They provide a haven for wildlife, providing forage, breeding and nesting sites for insects and birds. They improve air quality by absorbing pollutants and reduce the risk of flooding by absorbing water that would otherwise run off into storm drainage. Front gardens also help to cool our homes by providing shade. They also improve our health and wellbeing.
You don’t need a lot of time, money or equipment in order to green your outside space. Just plant up a container or adopt a nearby tree base. Every little helps to make a difference. According to the Royal Horticultural Society, a cumulative 22 million plants were added to UK gardens each year - the equivalent of 350 football pitches.
Find out how you can make your front garden greener, and don’t forget to check out our Front Garden Gallery.
“My two little girls loved planting up their patch. It was so nice to see them excited to be outside, learning about flowers, taking pride in the community we live in and wanting to make it better. It’s such a brilliant initiative”
Keep in touch!
