Friends of Abbey Gardens

A free event celebrating the second season of What Will The Harvest Be? at Abbey Gardens.

Anyone is welcome to come along and enjoy the garden, delicious food made with produce grown by our gardening club, and lots of tea and cake. Activities for grown-ups and children include garden-inspired competitions, garden tours and craft making. Vegetables, plants and flowers to take home are available for donations from our Honesty Stall.

11am: Bring your competition entries:
Bake a garden-themed cake or traybake (to be served at 3pm, after judging)
Please mark your container with your name, name of cake and ingredients

Build a plant portrait: a head or face made from fruit and vegetables
Label your plant portrait with your name and age

Make a flower arrangement on the theme of ‘What will the harvest be?’
in own container (not exceeding 75cm h x 50cm w x 50cm d)

12 noon: Harvest Festival opens
Garden tours, tea and cake throughout the afternoon

12-3pm: Activities
Build a head or face from vegetables to enter into our plant portrait competition
Print a patchwork of patterns with potatoes and natural plant dyes and juices
Make a miniature bouquet of paper collage flowers
Sew some bunting or take away a piece to sew at home

1.30pm: Cookery and tastings

2pm: Live flower arranging (entries can be submitted to the competition)

3pm: Competition judging

4pm: Harvest Festival closes

Just as early Summer’s flowers are turning to seed, suddenly there are rows of new crops everywhere. There’s lots to see and do.

We now have a volunteers’ list up in the cabin for the Harvest Festival on 11 Sept so if you can help, please take a look and add your name. And if you’d like to help with the event organisation, there will be another informal meeting at this Saturday’s garden club session.

Onions, potatoes and garlic harvested, peas, beans and tomatoes on the vine… it’s all happening at the garden. Which turns our thoughts to the Harvest Festival on 11 September and the planting plan for next season.

We’re having a Harvest Festival event meeting on Saturday 14 August after the garden club (weather permitting) – all volunteers who would like to help are very welcome. If you can’t come along on Saturday but you’d like to help, email us at mail@abbeygardens.org. Or if there’s something you’d love to grow (sweet potatoes are the first nomination) and you’d like to get involved in next year’s planting plan, our garden club leader Hamish will be organising planting plan sessions.

The fruit trees planted along the back wall of the garden earlier this year have had their Summer pruning by a team of volunteers, with pruning tips from garden club leader Hamish Liddle.
[Pictures © Somewhere]

Garden harvest, BBQ creations and treats from home: a Big Lunch was had by Abbey Gardens volunteers, friends and visitors and we were very, very full! Thanks to all who picked, cooked and brought.

Photos: Nina Pope

We will be having lunch at Abbey Gardens next Saturday 17 July at 1pm. We have decided to advance this nationwide event and have lunch as part of our regular gardening session.

We would like to ask everyone to bring food to share. We will get the BBQ going so feel free to bring anything you would like to cook. We have lots of potatoes and onions to make potato salad and lettuce for the green stuff. If you are lucky we will still have some artichokes left. Any contributions of cakes for pudding will be greatly appreaciated.

We hope to see you on Saturday

A magnificent haul of artichokes on a glorious gardening day: One globe had flowered, we had a tasting of artichokes that were ready to cook and there was a trug-full for the honesty stall.

The sun shone, the bunting fluttered, our fabulous new honesty stall designed by Public Works made its debut stocked with artichokes, broad beans and flowers and we had enough delicious home-made cakes to feed the neighbourhood several times over. Even our wildflowers made an appearance for the occasion. A big thank-you to everyone who helped, baked and visited, to the manufacturers and contractors for our new gate and honesty stall – and of course, to Community Spaces, London Borough of Newham and all of our other funders and supporters.

Summer Fair, Saturday 12 June, midday – 4pm

After a glorious Saturday’s gardening, Abbey Gardens is bright and beautiful for our Summer Fair.

Bring a picnic, take a tour, buy plants for your garden, see our nature and wildlife photography exhibition, taste our first produce, and enjoy family activities and garden games. We’ll be serving teas, coffees and delicious home-made cakes. At 2pm there will be speeches celebrating the completion of our Community Spaces grant which has funded repairs to our fence and gate, new grass, fruit trees, honesty stall, sustainable energy provision and many other useful things for the garden.

We’re also taking part in Open Garden Squares weekend, a London-wide event on 12 and 13 June.
Please note: entry to our garden is free of charge and you don’t need a ticket. If you want to make a weekend of it and visit other gardens in the Open Garden Squares scheme you’ll need a ticket for some venues, which you can buy when you get to them. For more details of other participating sites visit the Open Garden Squares website – you’ll find we’re the first in Newham!