'Get Growing in Wymering' community garden

Aim

St. Peter & St. Paul's Church are planning to build a community garden in an area of churchyard, to grow food to share with the community.

Like many people stuck at home during the summer of 2020, my passion for gardening and in particular growing vegetables, increased significantly, and an idea to develop a community garden in the churchyard here in Wymering grew. 

According to research by the Church of England and the Church Urban Fund, mental health problems in local communities are now the biggest social issue clergy encounter, second only to loneliness as a key concern. However, research has also shown that gardening can help to relieve the effects of depression, loneliness and a range of mental health issues. Churches have always sought to be places where people can find healing and community, so it seems only natural that we should look to develop our outside spaces to better meet these needs in our locality. An area of churchyard designated for use as a community garden gives us a fantastic opportunity to work with local groups and individuals, to build friendships, support better mental health and to grow food to share with the community.

But although the idea for this project began in 2020, it has taken us the last year and a half to bring it to birth, with church planning permission being required and the ground needing clearing and preparing. However, we are now ready to build and plant. We have a fantastic raised bed design for the 1st phase of our community garden project, which incorporates seating to encourage growers to gather, sit and enjoy the results of their hard work. Our aim is to create something of good quality that will last and be a blessing to our local community. Inevitably there is a cost involved in undertaking a project like this but we have been successful in securing part of the money and hope to crowdfund the rest. It has been said that “Gardening is an act of hope”, and heaven knows we need some hope with all the bad news in the world right now, so in hopeful anticipation of all that is to come, we have begun sowing seeds ready to plant into the raised beds once they are built. The cost of our raised bed design is £3067, plus approximately £400 for the soil to fill the beds. Please help us to get this project off the ground by donating anything you can. Thank you!

If you would like to get involved in the ‘Get Growing in Wymering’ Community Garden project, please email Revd Amy at: [email protected]

This project successfully funded on 4th July 2022