140 members of Islington U3a enjoyed drinks and nibbles at their annual summer party in Olden Community Garden

At the Music Festival we celebrated the 40^th anniversary of Olden Community Garden. The Mayor of Islington, Cllr Rosaline Ogunro, met local residents, including Pat Tawn whose vision and efforts led to the creation of the community garden in 1986.

A huge thank you to all who came! Visitors from Islington and beyond enjoyed home-made cake and tea on the lawn, and drinks from the bar. Music groups played throughout the afternoon: Kadialy Kouate (kora), The Angel Band (folk), Myles Jones Brass Band, Music for Children, Leora Cohen String Quartet, Erik Kris (Spanish guitar), AMLB Soundcheck, Archway Mountain Lightnin Boys (bluegrass), London International Gospel Choir. A special thank you to all our wonderful volunteers who made cakes and helped on the day, ensuring our music festival was a great success!

Volunteers from Macquarie built steps between the orchard and the vegetable garden and mulched fruit trees with manure from Freightliners Farm and donated woodchip. Thank you to the BIG Alliance for arranging the session.

Encouraged by beautiful sunny weather, over 70 visitors came to our National Garden Scheme (NGS) Open Day in April. Our visitors learned about our vegetable growing, walked in the woodland and enjoyed tea and cake outdoors. We raised funds for NGS good causes and to help pay for repairs to our terracing. We also welcome donations through Local Giving to help with our ongoing terracing repairs.

Kokedama is a traditional Japanese technique. Participants learned how to wrap the plant’s roots in a ball of soil and moss to create a beautiful, living sculpture. 

At our foraging session, volunteers dug up great quantities of three-cornered leek, an invasive species requiring much work to remove it every year. All parts of the plant, the bulb, flowers and leaves, are edible fresh or cooked. After making quantities of pesto with it, our volunteers enjoyed a three-cornered leek lunch and then took home jars of pesto.

We are very pleased to have been awarded a grant from MPGA (Metropolitan Parks and Gardens Association) for our new project in the ‘Forest Garden’ area of our refurbished terracing. Come and and volunteer with us in March and April to help prepare the ground and start the project.

Our Christmas wreath-making workshop in Olden Garden was a great success! Thank you to our gardener Caroline for leading it. This wreath was made at our workshop.

We are very pleased to have been awarded a grant from Islington Giving’s Make It Happen Fund, for our new project ‘Woodland Biodiversity Planting’. Come and and volunteer with us in March to help prepare the ground and start the project.