Something to shout about

Past events, celebrations and success stories ...

Aquarius Tenants Association via City South has asked us to guide them to transform 2 large concrete bed on Greenthorn Walk into a garden. The task was huge but the fun we've had even bigger ...! Thanks to our vols and the residents, we created two awesome beds full of herbs, fruit bushes, trees, flowers and veg.






 
Hazel coppicing day at Chorlton Water Park, March 2011 ...




 
 
  



BBC RADIO 4 GARDENERS' QUESTION TIME
hosted by Hulme Community Garden Centre ...








HCGC goes mobile! Simply Health, a Manchester based healthcare company, have shown their commitment to improving the health of the local community by supporting Hulme Community Garden Centre. Simply Health, which was founded as a mutual society and grew out of the ‘Manchester & Salford Hospital Saturday Fund’ have been incredibly generous and donated over £20,000 to HCGC. In recognising the contribution HCGC makes to improving the wellbeing and health of local people: Simply Health have paid for the re-skinning of our polytunnels, a photo-voltaic array for our new Eco-Classroom and last but certainly not least a brand new van which has been converted to use LPG rather than conventional fuel. The LPG conversion makes our little van much better for the environment.

By way of illustration: Compared to Petrol

75% Less carbon monoxide
85% Less hydrocarbons
40% Less oxides of nitrogen
87% Less ozone compared to Diesel
90% Less particulates, hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide
50% Less oxides of nitrogen
It takes over 120 LPG cars to equal the fine particles produced by one equivalent diesel car!

We want to say big thank you to Simply Health for supporting us.




    

    








Saying goodbye to Bill and Steve. Thanks everyone for coming. Enjoy your spuds!


Hulme Community Garden Centre ran a series of workshops for local people demonstrating PERMACULTURE which created a garden as part of the Ecobuild project. Further sessions are taking place in Leaf Street in Hulme throughout the year, every Friday from 3pm. It's free - get involved!
 


Delloite team as part of their challenge made a chair out of an old pallet. The chair idea was taken from the Permaculture Magazine. Thank you Delloite for the most comfy seat ever!
  

 

 
If you want to take part in a Challenge with your organisation, give us a ring ...!


 
A new green roof on our old compost toilet was build a few weeks ago. Thanks to the Kelloggs team, we made a new green roof with wild flowers and herbs. Thank you Kelloggs!

Eliza Street Community Garden is now complete. Thanks to all our volunteers and the kids of Eliza Street! The garden planting workshops were commissioned by Places for People.

Amanda, Vicky and Cathy have worked hard to construct a new window in the willow hedge. Next year we'll do another one on the other side.  Perhaps a square one ...    

 
Before and after ... Thanks to the Twilight group, in participation with Arcspace Manchester, who planted the sunflowers in May. Next year we must beat our target height of 4m!


Spring Thing! 2010
A celebration of all things Spring! With our Friday Club we built a scarecrow. Everybody did something, either sowing, sawing, nailing, hammering, stuffing, planting and we entered 'Gary Scarecrow' to the Chorlton Big Green Festival.


Potato Day 2010
Potato expert Bill Whitehead, and his assistant Steve, were on hand for advice and information with their extensive display of heritage and rare seed potatoes ! Warm soup and bread and fire were de rigueur ...



Apple & Pumpkin Day 2009
Thank you to Abundance Manchester for sharing the city's harvest of apples and a big colourful
thank you to Siobhain for her amazing face painting skills.




Hulme Community Garden Centre’s Green Roof development is a partnership project between Manchester City Council’s (MCC) Green City Team, Red Rose Forest Network, the BBC and Lancashire Wildlife Trust. Completed in early 2009 this is the first public access green roof in Manchester and will form part of an ongoing green roof project at HCGC. We hope to establish our Centre as a beacon site for green roof development in the North West. Green roofs are more than a cosmetic improvement to the built environment: they provide many environmental benefits:

Reduction of Urban Heat Island – Research suggests we need a 10% increase in green space in our cities to combat climate change. This is particularly relevant to the reduction of the Urban Heat Island [UHIE]. Green roofs are recognized to have a positive effect on reducing the UHIE

Biodiversity - Green roofs can provide important refuges for wildlife in urban areas. Rare invertebrate populations and ground nesting birds such as Sklylarks, Terns and Lapwings are benefited and as this roof is planted with wildflowers we also encourage the bee population.

Water - Green roofs can significantly reduce the surface run off volumes and rates of rainfall leaving roofs. As a source control mechanism in the Sustainable Urban Drainage System green roofs can help reduce flash floods as a consequence of intense rainfall events. This will become increasingly important as a consequence of climate change.

Green roofs also improve the quality of water and although the amount of water is reduced it is possible to rainfall harvest from roofs that have been greened.

Thermal Performance - Green roofs cannot be given a ‘U-value’ at present. However they have been shown to significantly reduce the need for air conditioning in summer and can provide a degree of insulation in winter. They are also an effective means of soundproofing and protect the roof surface from ultra-violet radiation and mechanical damage

Protection of Waterproofing - Green roofs have now been shown to double if not triple the life of waterproofing membranes beneath the green roof.

Air Quality – airborne particles and pollutants are filtered from the atmosphere by the substrates and vegetation on a green roof.

Amenity Space – in dense urban environments there is often a lack of green space for residents. Roof Gardens and roof top parks provide important green spaces to improve the quality of life for urban residents. Here at HCGC we are also passionate about local food and our green roof, in spite of the depth of the growing medium, we can grow fruit and vegetables! There are also the psychological benefits of being able to see greenery within the City and the fact that a green roof blends in with surroundings, can provide a garden for the inhabitants of buildings, they mask ugly rooftops and complement building forms.

The project has been developed with Outer Space Landscapes, who previously built the green roofs at Unicorn Grocery in Chorlton and the MERCi building in Ancoats. 


Summer Party 2009
Bands playing were: At Swim Two Birds, Sarah Brannan, Spencer Cloud & The Range Brothers,
James H Jacob, Matt Dickson from Matt & Phred's.




Compost Day 2009




In 2004, HCGC entered the Tatton RHS Show and won a Bronze Medal! We proposed an urban garden, a sitting area and raised beds bursting with vegetables, flowers and herbs along with a composting facility and a stepping stone patio planted with sented compact herbs like camomile and thyme.