Spare land around New Barnet bowling green becomes a community garden under Barnet Council scheme to take advantage of under-used space 

A new community garden has been established in New Barnet through a partnership between a church and a bowls club.

A blessing to celebrate the opening of the garden at the East Barnet Valley Bowls Club was conducted by the Reverend Sharon Ejinkonye, the newly installed vicar at St James Church, New Barnet.

Produce from the garden will be offered to needy residents visiting Jim’s Café, a Wednesday morning community advice centre and coffee morning organised by the church.

The partnership came about because the bowls club, next to Victoria Recreation Ground, New Barnet, had spare land and the church was looking for a new site for its community garden.

In her blessing to celebrate the opening of the new garden, Sharon thanked Barnet Council and the bowls club for sharing their vision and creating a space where they could work together nourishing plants and vegetables.

Jeremy Alford – see above with Sharon – who helped co-ordinate the development of the new garden said it was a replacement for a previous community garden in the former St James vicarage.

“When we lost that garden at the old vicarage, we realised the bowls club had spare land on an ideal site where we could work together and we have now adopted the space.”

A garden shed purchased with a grant from the National Gardens Scheme was moved successfully from the vicarage to the bowls club.

Every Tuesday morning volunteers care for the garden which was developed with raised beds and stocked with the help of grants from the Faiths Forum for London and the National City Park Foundation.

Bowls club secretary David Mulford – see above with Sharon – said it was the ideal solution to use their vacant garden to host a community garden for the church.

An extra bonus was that following the reseeding of the club’s green, there was plenty of surplus soil to build up the new beds for the garden.

Work started developing the garden last November and despite the summer drought, they are hoping for a good crop of vegetables, including tomatoes, runner beans, sweet corn, garlic and other crops.

Now that the community garden is a visible presence in Victoria Recreation Ground, the bowls club and church are hoping users and visitors to the park and leisure centre will get involved.