This week is The Mayor of London's National Park City Festival. The Festival is city-wide and celebrates London becoming the first urban national park in the world, with three objectives: making London greener, healthier and wilder. 

As part of the festival, the Tooting Community Garden is running a free family fun day this Sunday 28th July, 12pm to 4pm. 

They’re celebrating city growing and the outdoors and aiming to create an environment which is good the community and for nature.

They're also celebrating their 8th birthday as a community garden! They’ve opened to the community on almost every Sunday for 8 years, and they also facilitate other community programmes there. For six years they’ve run outdoor learning with Gatton School and garden and wellbeing activities with the beneficiaries at CARAS, the Tooting charity working with asylum-seekers and refugees. They’re also able to offer to share the space with everyone locally and are very grateful to Naseem Aboobaker of Mushkil Aasaan for the free use of her land to create this community garden during these years.
 

On Sunday, everyone is welcome to come along and enjoy the space – no need to book.
Bring a picnic, and they'll provide activities, green space, shade and plenty of cool water! They’ll also be offering a particular welcome to families with young children or babies – come and have some outdoor time in a safe and welcoming place. They'll have a range of fun garden-themed activities for families and young children.

They're also running three timed workshops – just drop in:

• 12:30 to 1:30: learn about making vertical wall planters so you can garden anywhere with very little space.
• 1:00 to 2:00: learn about selecting and taking care of plants, and choose some to pot up and take home.
• 2:30 - 3:30: be 'Drawn to Nature' and join their plant life drawing workshop for adults and teenagers.

Of course you can simply come along and enjoy being in the garden – so do bring a blanket to sit on and a picnic!
 

This article would not be possible without the support of our fantastic Community Partners. Click here to find out more.