Partnership with The Royal Horticultural Society and the NHS, to fund the first Healing Garden at the University Hospital Lewisham
As part of a strategic partnership between the The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) and the NHS, the Marks Family Charitable Trust funded the first Healing Garden supporting keyworkers and their communities.
The RHS teamed up with the Lewisham and Greenwich NHS trust at University Hospital Lewisham (UHL) to create a Healing Garden, funded by the Marks Family Charitable Trust. This is the first of several Healing Gardens as part of a national programme to create green spaces where staff and patients can reflect and recharge. The Lewisham Healing Garden will provide the blueprint for further gardens built as part of the programme at hospitals around the UK. The RHS wants the Healing Gardens created to be hopeful places that have a transformational impact on the wellbeing of the communities they sit within.
NHS staff and visitors, NHS Hospital Lewisham Healing Garden Opening in June 2022 © RHS
A closer look at the design
Adam Frost UHL Healing Garden design © RHS
Designed by award-winning landscape designer Adam Frost in consultation with the UHL community, the garden makes use of existing but under-utilised outdoor space and will feature a wildflower wellbeing walk along the Ravensbourne River. There are areas that have been zoned for individuals to sit quietly, spaces for social gatherings, and a working garden where people can get involved and grow their gardening skills.
The path through the garden follows the flowing shape of the river, connecting both sides of the site, so staff, patients and families can have a pleasant walk through to their destination. There will be plenty of seating, as well as sheltered areas to enjoy the restorative power of the garden in all weathers. Plants have been chosen for their ability to delight the senses, such as soft ferns, scented Mediterranean favourites and bright additions such as wild daffodils (Narcissus pseudonarcissus) and dark blue Clematis ‘The President’, spindle (Euonymus europaeus) and roses such as Rosa ‘Climbing Iceberg’ that will provide seasonal colour throughout the year.
Community groups and NHS staff planted up the garden over two very hot days in June and have committed to keep watering and looking after it, as well as growing new plants to add to the beautiful planting scheme. The final elements, including the working garden area will be installed in autumn 2022.
NHS staff and visitors, NHS Hospital Lewisham Healing Garden Opening in June 2022 © RHS
As part of the project, the RHS is working with the local community and NHS staff over three years, to engage and train more than 200 local volunteers, so they can improve their gardening skills and ensure the garden is well cared for in the future. A programme of wellbeing activities linked to the garden is being developed by Alice Cornwell, RHS Community Development Officer.
Garden designer Adam Frost, with NHS anaesthetist Maria Leong, at the NHS Hospital Lewisham Healing Garden Opening in June 2022 © RHS
Maria Leong, the UHL anaesthetist registrar who first asked the RHS for help to create the garden, said: “We are all really looking forward to the welcome boost the Healing Garden will provide staff, patients and the local community when it opens later this year. We’re delighted that our previously overlooked green space will be able to provide a range of benefits that will become part and parcel of our offering to patients and their visitors.”
Adam Frost, designer of the Healing Garden, added: “I was so pleased to be able to design the Healing Garden in Lewisham as a way to show support for the tireless work of our NHS staff. The garden is an inclusive space that will provide that all-important connection to plants and gardens and support the mental, physical and social health of the local community.”
Sustainability at its heart
Co-creating gardens within NHS settings supports the NHS strategic shift towards social prescribing and preventative health interventions, as well as contributing towards the NHS ‘Net Zero’ strategy, which aims to tackle the climate crisis in ways that include developing the green infrastructure of their sites.
The garden programme also links to the RHS Sustainability Strategy, which states that within the decade, the RHS aims to become net positive for nature and for people, encouraging and enabling gardeners to do the same.
NHS Hospital Lewisham Healing Garden Opening in June 2022 © RHS
About the work of the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS)
The Royal Horticultural Society is the UK’s largest gardening charity with a mission is to enrich everyone’s life through plants, and make the UK a greener and more beautiful place. Our reach gives us the ability to inspire over 600,000 RHS members and connect with an audience of millions through our gardens, shows, education and community programmes.
For more than 200 years the RHS has been a pre-eminent force behind the nation’s gardening. Never in this time has it been more critical for gardening to be part of the solutions for today’s climate, biodiversity, environmental and social challenges.
The RHS’s Community Outreach Team has been working in the UK’s communities for many years, delivering a range of projects to individuals and small community groups that support people to be healthier and happier through gardening. The team works in partnership with the voluntary sector, local authorities, schools, businesses and training organisations to upskill and empower people to green up their local area.
The Healing Gardens project is part of the team’s strategy to scale up our wellbeing work to create powerful positive impacts for people through the creation of community-based wellbeing hubs.
Our vision for Healing Gardens and its intended legacy is to champion the creation of these spaces as a valuable resource within all new and existing healthcare workplaces, as a catalyst to improve mental health and wellbeing for staff, residents and wider communities. We will continue to build our important relationship with the NHS and work with funders and partners who share our vision to enable more people to enjoy the benefits of gardening.
Website
https://www.rhs.org.uk