primary school growing garden
The school had recently filled in a pond area that had become overgrown and was no longer a space that the children could use freely. The school needed suggestions on how the space could be used more effectively. With the help of Catriona Knight Garden Design, it was decided that the ideal solution was the creation of an outside growing area with raised beds for vegetable growing, new planting borders and providing plenty of space for the children to be taught outdoors.
concept plans
A complete site survey was undertaken and from this three concept plans were designed based on the school wheel. The designs included eight raised growing beds with wide seating space for the children, a composting and shed zone and a small water feature to replace the old pond. These were presented to the school and the second concept was chosen for construction.
construction
The construction was completed by a council approved contractor, with Catriona Knight Garden Design providing onsite support and guidance. Low level beds were created with seating space around the top for the children to sit on, as well as a log circle. The path and the main growing area were divided by two different types of gravel to identify the individual spaces and additional borders down the path and around the growing area were created for fruit trees, herbs and shrubs.
planting
Bulbs were planted in the first autumn and created wonderful colours in the spring. The raised vegetable beds have been used the most successfully, with children learning about crop rotation, plant spacing and general crop maintenance. The inclusion of a couple of scarecrows helped to emphasise this is a garden focused on the children. The end of year harvest, provided wonderful crops of sweetcorn, courgettes, french beans, tomatoes, beetroot, carrots, leeks and broad beans. Catriona Knight Garden Design have helped run the after school gardening club, which proved so popular it had to be run in two groups to accommodate all the children that wanted to attend. As well as planting in the beds, they also decorated pots and planted flowering plants to attract bees and other beneficial insects, created scarecrows and windchimes to distract the birds and planted vegetables in welly boots which were then lined up at the entrance to the garden.
