The Garden House began as a community project in 2015. With growing support from our local community, our work with organisations and we achieved charitable status in January 2019.
The day to day running of the farm and cafe is completely volunteer led, run by a team composed of a small number of trustees and committee members who work together with volunteers from the community.
This summer as we have all noticed, we have a huge amount of rain.
This has massively impacted the footfall into The Garden House. Usually visitors come in all week long, particularly at weekends donating anywhere between £3 and £10 per person. Without the usual donations coming in we have found ourselves struggling to cover the costs of animal feed, maintenance and day to day expenses that are incurred when running a farm.
The community of Stockport and neighbouring boroughs come to The Garden House for a family visit, with our wonderful animals and café. However, The Garden House is so much more than that.
The Garden House is a safe place that supports those with learning difficulties, brain injuries and addiction to find their purpose, gain their confidence and to find their way in the world. We don’t just need your help to stay here as a beautiful place to visit, we need your help to keep supporting those people who need us.
Why should you help us?
The Garden house has become a safe place for the community, particularly those in need of support.
In the years The Garden House has been operating we have taken rehab patients in who have experience brain trauma to support their recovery and mental health.
We have had staff from The Ambulance Service who had witnessed horrific accidents and were suffering with PTSD come in to help to look after animals and support with the gardening and day to day running. Their occupational health team told us this was key in getting staff back to work in a positive way.
Alongside these relationships we work with some incredible volunteers who came to us when they needed to gain confidence. A recent volunteer had struggled with addiction. At the time he joined us you could see the effects of addiction, he was withdrawn and struggling to find a way out. He was a talented joiner and used his skills to support the Garden House for 3 years. Through this volunteering he built his confidence and was distracted from his addiction. We are thrilled that he has now moved on from The Garden House to take up a full time position in local town for a bespoke company.
Please consider donating to our appeal today so that we can keep giving back and supporting our community.