During the year April 2016 to March 2017 Transition Edinburgh South partnered with Edinburgh Food Social. The pictures capture the work around the Gracemount Walled Garden, growing and cooking food that is good for people and environment. It has been a successful year involving many locals, the schools, youth groups, and volunteers of all ages from many organisations. This was made possible by the Climate Challenge Fund and with further contributions from the Dunedin Canmore Youth Project, the Mushroom Trust and Awards for All

Click on a picture to zoom in. You can use the arrow buttons on the left and right to go forwards and backwards.

Highlights from a year with Gracemount Grow Stronger. An image of 3 children in a garden smiling beside a wheelbarrow.

Thanks to all of the volunteers and local people who have contributed so much in hard work, enthusiasm, support and company: Brian, Steve Hendry, John Murray, Marie & Karen, John Boag M.B.E., Eileen, Mike H, Margaret, Caro & musicians, Mike, Daryl, Steven Hunter, Ben, Yildiz & family, John & Angie, Patrick, Sarah, Amanda, Suzanne & family, Martin

May 2016 - March 2017 with support from Climate Challenge Fund and The Scottish Government. Building a community culture of organic growing, cooking & eating fruit and vegetables. Seasonal recipes, community meals and cooking skills for children, supporting health & well-being. Events, volunteering, local school sessions & composting in Gracemount Walled Garden. Picture shows 5 school children in a garden with a bucket of freshly picked potatoes.

Community meals from Edinburgh Food Social. Two photos of people sitting at a table in the garden eating a meal together.

Several pictures showing fresh salad, fresh vegetables, and food made from vegetables in the garden.

Photos show people eating food around a table. A sign says "Gracemount Community Garden".

Photos show people eating around the table. One photo shows children pointing at the garden, with an old house and one of the walls of the garden in the background.

Volunteers. Two photos showing childen helping to construct a polytunnel and tipping compost into a planting bed.

Posed photographs of volunteers in the garden, and one photo of volunteers working to plant and tidy the walled garden.

More photographs of volunteers planting in the garden. One photo shows a group of people building a wooden frame, while another shows a man posing on the ground next to a newly planted bed.

More people working in the garden. One shows 3 people posing in the sunshine, while another 2 show people digging right next to the walls.

Gracemount Primary School. Children making food from the garden's produce.

Gracemount High School. Children learning in a Food Technology class.

Recipe book development. Students participate in a workshop to develop a recipe book. A spread of post-it notes is laid out on a large piece of paper.

St Catherine's After School Club. Children pose with different food items. A whiteboard says: "Milk is good for your teeth and bones. Why it's good to eat food grown in our country. I learned to grate cheese. I learned about a new herb - thyme. I learned how to crack eggs."

Gracemount Primary School. Children learning to cook food in a kitchen; gathered around a pot and another group around a worktop.

"We love our walled garden and woods. All our classes have been active growing and cooking over at the Mansion. We use the grounds like it is an extension to our playground and the community gardeners are part of our school team. Our teachers use the woods to develop outdoor learning with our children and the Transition team have been vital in developing the confidence of both staff and children. Taking learning outdoors is a big part of what we want to do at Gracemount and linking in with our community partners to make our curriculum more relevant and exciting is part of that agenda. The impact on our school has been so positive and we have shared our achievements with parents through our online Learning Journals and through our school Facebook. With Golden time activities, Classroom activities and Nursery involvement the community gardeners have become on first name terms with half of our large school population! More of the same next year guys please!" Greg Dimeck Headteacher Gracemount Primary School

Rosyth Community Hub and Craigour Park Primary School. Parents and children making meals.

Golden Time in the garden. A child holds a vegetable that has just been pulled out of the ground. Her hands are covered in mud. "I thought it was going to be rubbish, but it's been great!" A child from Gracemount Primary P3

Pictures of children playing and flowers in the sunshine.

St Catherine's After School Club. Children sitting in a tent and participating in activities in the garden.

St. Catherine’s Nursery. "The Nursery children have been visiting the Mansion House Garden every Thursday afternoon. The main aim of these sessions is to give the children opportunities for free outdoor and exploratory play which many of them would not get otherwise. Activities carried out at the garden cover many aspects of Curriculum of Excellence Early Level outcomes, especially in literacy, health and well-being, science and social studies. It is also a very beneficial link with the local community. Most importantly the children absolutely love coming over to the garden. They talk about it when we are at nursery and we have made a picture diary which they like to look at during the week. They are really enthusiastic about coming and like to tell their parents what they have been doing." Mrs Marian Coleman, St. Catherine's Nursery

Green Team St. Catherine’s Primary School. A group of students work in the garden.

Gracemount Primary School. Children raking up leaves.

Children play in the garden.

"The Giving Nature a Home project in Edinburgh strives to connect people and communities to nature through activities and practical conservation. Gracemount Walled Garden has been the perfect platform allowing us to do this. Since starting to work within Gracemount we have connected with 147 children through mini-beast hunts, making hundreds of bird feeders, over 30 bird boxes and 20 solitary bee homes for the site and for people’s own gardens. We’ve spoken to 161 adults about giving nature a home and the importance of doing this in your own garden. We’ve also gathered people from other community groups, environmental charities and local schools to a networking event to skill share and develop our project further. Without community gardens like Gracemount, RSPB wouldn’t be able to connect as many people to nature and help improve areas for wildlife." Amber Jenkins, RSPB Community Green Space Officer

"We are extremely grateful to have been warmly welcomed into Gracemount Walled Garden and Mansion. This has been of huge benefit to Service Users and has enabled a pretty seamless transition from a previous site. The activities our Service Users have been participating in have included: sawing, planting, weeding, composting, harvesting and general garden clean-ups." Euan Robertson, Senior Support Worker at Edinburgh Outreach Autusm Initatives

The Garden Team. Photos show the garden team having fun in the garden and speaking to children.

Primary school veggie beds. Photos show plants growing in wooden raised beds.

"The team at Gracemount Walled Garden have provided St. Catherine’s Green Team with: ● Adult mentoring for the children and positive male role models ● Experience of the world of work for children in non-working households ● A space in our local community where groups of pupils can experience gardening, growing, team work, outdoor learning, physical activity and ownership of a project. The impact of this has been: ● Pupil groups have engaged in gardening and outdoor learning on a regular basis across the whole year ● Children are learning to spend time productively outdoors and are starting to understand their own impact on the environment ● Pupils have experienced the success of growing a wide variety of plants, many of which they have gone on to use in cooking activities at school and at home ● Pupils are developing a sense of themselves being part of a wider community and have a growing sense of respect and responsibility to contribute to this in a positive way ● As a teacher I have been supported in developing my knowledge and skills in teaching growing and sustainability." Morag McGregor - St. Catherine’s Primary School teacher

Building a community culture of growing and eating fruit and vegetables. Children in the garden trying vegetables.

"St. Catherine’s is actively engaged with Gracemount Walled Garden. This work involves a group of our children attending a gardening after-school club on a Friday and a cooking session on a Wednesday. The children in this group are within the Scottish Government’s Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation deciles 1 and 2. This means that the children are seen to be living in the lowest brackets of poverty in our society. This work, which is an excellent example of cross-community working, has focused on teaching the children about sustainable lifestyles and knowledge of healthy eating and self-sufficiency. These are not just fun skills to learn for the children, but valuable and irreplaceable life skills for these children in the future. Targeting these children at such an early age will hopefully help them to overcome their current life situation and give them knowledge for life that is invaluable for a positive future." Paul Hunter, Head of St. Catherine's Primary School. Photo shows a large sunflower.

The Conservation Volunteers

Composting. "We were not born for pavements and escalators, but for thunder and mud." Jay Griffiths

Supporting people to get growing in local gardens. Pictures of families growing in their own garden.

More photos of families working in residential gardens.

Dunedin Canmore Youth Project. Youth volunteers working in the garden.

Children eating and learning in the garden.

Power of Food Festival, 18th June 2016

Children playing at the Gracie Winter Warmer, Saturday 21st January 2016.

Children playing at the Gracie Winter Warmer, Saturday 21st January 2016.

Edinburgh Food Social, event catering.

Edinburgh Food Social, team.

"Having always been interested in gardening I've found the Grow Stronger team extremely helpful and approachable. I've attended many of the events that have been put on within the Walled Garden and found them informative for myself and my children. The children came away from the events wanting to grow their seeds and plant things within our garden. I also recently entered a gardening competition where myself and the children grew potatoes, kale and other summer vegetables. The kale is so successful it's growing again and getting big! It's a great place to learn and very well worth having in the Gracemount area. I hope they are able to continue the work they are doing and make Gracemount bloom. They are teaching the children and the youth of today a very special thing." Suzanne Baxter, local resident.

"I believe that the more clearly we can focus our attentions on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction." Rachel Carson

"Late capitalism teaches us to create ourselves through our consumer choices: shopping is how we form our identities, find community and express ourselves. Thus, telling people that they can’t shop as much as they want to because the planet’s support systems are overburdened can be understood as a kind of attack, akin to telling them that they cannot truly be themselves.…" Naomi Klein, The Change Within: The Obstacles We Face Are Not Just External

Children learning in the garden.

Trips for inspiration. Tea plantation, and the Lost Garden of Penicuick

Hope for the future. We will continue our work in Gracemount Walled Garden, working with volunteers and local schools, to maintain a positive, thriving community space which teaches organic food growing, healthy cooking, stewardship for our environment and well-being.

We would love to see the Walled Garden continue to flourish, the woodland preserved and the derelict stable block restored and in use as a community asset and a hub for affordable healthy food. Our hope is for generations of children growing up in Gracemount to be familiar with the garden as a source of organic food, and the woodland as a place of well-being.

With thanks to our partners, for your work, help & enthusiasm: Gracemount Primary School St. Catherine’s Primary & Nursery School Dunedin Canmore Youth Project Gracemount Community Project Edinburgh & Lothians Greenspace Trust RSPB Trust Conservation Volunteers Moredun Library Grass Roots Remedies Parkour Rusty Dr. Bike Open Community Choir Fare Share from the Shrub Mara Seaweed RBGE Cyrenians Bridgend Inspiring Growth Autism Initiatives Liberton Kirk students Craigour Park Primary School Rosyth Community Hub Gracemount High School

With thanks to the Climate Challenge Fund

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