Community Voice and Collaboration
Our work is shaped with the community, not just delivered to it. Most of our trustees, staff and volunteers are local residents or have strong connections to the neighbourhoods where we work, helping ensure our activities reflect local priorities and needs.
We value everyone’s voice. We call everyone who gift their time to participate in our work a volunteer, regardless of their support needs or whether they were referred to us. Each year we ask our volunteers for feedback and ideas through our annual survey to help shape the charity’s future activities.
We believe lasting change comes through collaboration. We actively build partnerships, share learning and contribute to networks that strengthen the community gardening, environmental and climate justice sectors. We have hosted networking events bringing together community gardens from across London and are active members of organisations such as Social Farms & Gardens and Hammersmith and Fulham’s Food For All Partnership. We also regularly share our learning through talks, meetings and events, such as at the Urban Greening Symposium Part II: The Gardened Public Space at the Garden Museum. We also offer our Professional Tours of our gardens for representatives of businesses, charities and local government to learn more about what we do and explore the possibility of working with us in the future. As well as being a networking opportunity, participants can visit the spaces and learn about the education, health and wellbeing programmes that they host. (For upcoming dates and times, please email info@hcga.org.uk).
Our collaborative approach also extends beyond our own projects. We have delivered community engagement and consultation on behalf of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham, working with local groups to shape improvements to Ravenscourt Park Wildlife Area, and acted as advisors to the Greening Westminster programme, helping support fairer access to high-quality green spaces across the borough.