Grow-your-own gardens…
A plant-based diet is now acknowledged as a major contributor to a healthier lifestyle, but there are other benefits besides easting more fruit and vegetables that can boost your health and wellbeing. Rather than popping down to the supermarket or ordering on-line, growing your own – organically if you can – brings with it benefits beyond the delicious fresh produce you can enjoy at your table.
“The physical creation and tending of your plot – whether it’s a patio container, a corner of your garden, an allotment or a full-blown kitchen garden – can help keep you fit and motivated, and inspire a great sense of optimism. And, if you get your planning and storage right, you can enjoy home-grown produce throughout the year,” says National Garden Scheme CEO, George Plumptre.
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- Skool Beanz Children’s Allotment
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- Rhubarb Farm
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- Herefordshire Growing Point
Many National Garden Scheme gardens include greenhouses and vegetable patches where owners produce edibles for their own consumption, others work on a more commercial scale like the stunning Goldstone Hall Gardens in Shropshire. We also open allotment groups where visitors can pick up growing tips from a diverse range of allotment holders like the Willoughby Road Allotments in Lincolnshire or Helen’s Bay Organic in County Down.
Many of the projects we support through our Community Garden Grants have a big focus on seed to plate and some of them host National Garden Scheme open days; head to the Growing for Change Organic Market Garden in Gwynedd, The Wonky Garden in Cheshire, The Rhubarb Farm in Nottinghamshire, Herefordshire Growing Point in Hereford or Skool Beanz Children’s Allotment in Somerset for some great examples of community gardening in action.
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- The Wonky Garden ©Liz Mitchell
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- Growing for Change Organic Market Garden
From prize-winning dahlia’s to delicious fresh produce and heaps of community spirit there are so many special places opening for the National Garden Scheme in 2025 all offering a wonderful taster of how to grow your own and life on the allotment.
Lead image: Goldstone Hall Gardens ©Joe Wainwright
To find out more about the National Garden Scheme’s Community Garden Grants click here
Click here to see all the upcoming garden openings where the garden has a ‘vegetable area’
This story was originally published in the 2025 Little Yellow Book of Gardens and Health – Click here to read the original story in full
