Garden to Connect brings people closer to nature and each other
We make the urban landscape greener and bring people closer to nature and each other. Garden to Connect reuses discarded plastic building products for sustainable, beautiful, and inclusive urban gardens. Our gardens brings 'Nature' to people living in the cities. We transform grey urban left-over spaces to revitalizing oasis. Social life and interactions is supported along with re-connecting to living nature.
Local
Denmark
Region Midt - Aarhus
Mainly urban
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)
No
No
Yes
2022-08-31
As individual(s) in partnership with organisation(s)
First name: Marianne Last name: Mikkelsen Gender: Female Please describe the type of organization(s) you work in partnership with: PVC Information Council and Vinyl Plus Nationality: Denmark Function: Project Manager Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Gustav Holms Vej 45 Town: Aarhus Postal code: 8200 Country: Denmark Direct Tel:+45 24 94 63 23 E-mail:marianne@miklsn.dk Website:https://www.gardentoconnect.eu/
First name: Betina Last name: Ringby Gender: Female Please describe the type of organization(s) you work in partnership with: PVC Information Council and Vinyl Plus Nationality: Denmark Function: Project co-operator Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Alsvej 32 Town: Risskov Postal code: 8240 Country: Denmark Direct Tel:+45 44 11 18 26 E-mail:bringby@gmail.com Website:https://www.gardentoconnect.eu/
We make the urban landscape greener and bring people closer to nature and each other. Garden to Connect reuses discarded plastic pipes from building sites to make urban gardens. By doing so, we prolong the lifetime of the plastic pipes before they get recycled. Growing plants in discarded pipes is accessible for everyone as building waste is usually available for free.
Garden to Connect has until now successfully build more than ten urban gardens in a variety of settings, e.g. in kindergardens, schools, nursing homes, at festivals, at local libraries, a rehabilitation center and in public parks. Among the venues where the project has been displayed are three major sustainability festivals around the country.
With a simple, cheap construction, Garden to Connect offers a contribution to a toolbox for working with SDG’s (particularly 11, 12, 13 and 15). Furthermore, the Inner Development Goals are addressed, when people engage in gardening where they live.
Garden to Connect was in May 2022 selected to be displayed at the New European Bauhaus Festival i Brussels.
Urban gardens
Community building
Inclusion
Circular economy
Biodiversity
Urban farms and urban gardens often involve growth systems made from resource intensive materials such as steel and terracotta, or old tires or impregnated wood that may migrate unwanted substances to plants, water and soil. Reuse of plastic pipes is both safe and sustainable. Migration of unwanted substances is negligible, and production of virgin material is avoided. Studies show that reusing PVC instead of using virgin PVC can reduce the GHG emissions of urban garden structures of about 85%.
PVC pipes are not necessarily perceived as beautiful. The plants and ownership make them beautiful.
The orange color is very urban-industrial. When exposed to sun, they fade, and look more like terracotta - yet without being ridiculously expensive, heavy and sensitive to frost.
The beauty and quality of experience lies mainly in the plants. The raised pipes make the plants easily available and invites visitors to come closer, look closer, feel the twigs, sniff the flowers, taste the leaves.
One plant, placed in one pipe, with a clearly name tag, reduce the 'fear of unknown green stuff' that characterice many modern citizens in cities.
Exemplarity:
- Left-over construction bits of pvc pipes are available anywhere in urban settings. It's free, safe and easy to handle.
- Herbs provide stimuli for all senses and are - not least - a conversation starter, also among formerly-strangers. They connect us to the past and give promise of future. Plants provide seeds and cuttings, to be generously shared, to empower anyone to grow their own and thereby connect to urban nature and neighbors.
Garden to Connect makes gardening economically inclusive. Plant containers for urban gardens are often prohibitively expensive, in particular in developing countries such as Rwanda. Discarded building products such as pipes perform just as well and can often be sourced free of charge at local construction and demolition sites and recycling centers.
Herbs in raised pipes are easily available for children in strollers and adults in wheelchairs alike.
The generally 'tamed' nature reduce fear of unknown for people raised off the ground, with no former contact with soil and plants.
Containers are for free. Soil very cheap. Plants and seeds shared for free.
Citizens and visitors from other cultures, speaking other languages, recognize and reconnect via the herbs.
Exemplarity:
- Can be established anywhere with very little effort and investment. Can be moved and developed in an ongoing process by any participant. This gives a high degree of ownership. When citizens participate in establishing garden-pipes, we all write our names on the pipes, a simple yet solid marker of belonging.
Participants and visitors alike benefit from the joy of plants in urban settings. Anyone are welcome to harvest herbs and seeds. We all gain a connection to nature through the plants that are present where we spend our daily lifes.
Anyone involved in construction has taken ownership and gained a sense of belonging to the location. We have seen a high percentage of participation from citizens being visitors (migrants of various sorts), since anyone can garden together, even without sharing a common language.
Involvement has nourished diversity, togetherness and inclusion.
A core value is the simplicity, which any visitor has understood in a glimpse of an eye. Next, each and every visitor has applied something personal and unique to a plant, adding a story, a memory, a question, a request - and generously shared with any other visitor present at the same time.
Citizens where invited in establishing, growing and harvesting. Their different perspectives and interests made the garden design more diverse. Their bringing cuttings and seeds home and to other gardens, strengthened and enlarged the scope of the project.
Stakeholders involved includes local municipality, library, church, school, nursing home. Every stakeholder has nursed own interests as well as supported the project, hence building connections and strengthening local communicities.
Urban planning, gardening and community building interacts when gardening to connect. Every stakeholder involved has seen a solution to one of their own challenges, wheich the gardens contributed to solve.
A key factor is the simplicity of the construction, making room for a great variety of dreams and uses.
Garden to Connect provides access to (re)connect with nature where you live your everyday life, in the city.
The tendency to elevate 'Nature' (with a capital N) to something mighty, out there in the wild, contains a risk of making it even harder to connect to, since very few people have the time and resources to get out and away. Research show, that if a green space is more than 2-300 meters from your front door, you do not get to benefit from it on a daily basis. Garden to Connect can bring nature to your doorstep and balcony, thus optimizing your connection and positive outcome of engaging in living plants.
Establishing a garden is most commonly a lasting structure, hence demanding longterm planning and continuity.
A garden in reused plastic pipes is flexible and moveable, hence making gardens accessable under conditions with permanent temporality. E.g. in city areas, where construction is going on. For people living somewhere non-permanent, be it refugees, students abroad, workers away from home, children in care homes, ...
The move-ability opens for testing out, trying out and flexible, continued reconstruction and development.
City-gardens tend to be expensive and resource consuming, e.g. plantcontainers of steel, concrete, terracotta. Reused building waste is for free, it saves money, material and CO2 to reuse it in the cities, where it is produced.
This type of urban nature demands no big plan, investment, administration: It is easily unfold in a local setting, adjusted to local needs, wishes and conditions.
Hands-on + just-do-it - let's try and see how we get along.
Innovative approach to trash, seeing waste as a resource for growing plants and people, beautifying urban spaces, bringing nature to town.
We have approach anyone - high or low, public and private, mighty and tiny - and invited them to join. We make it simple, easy, cheap and accessible.
Plastic pipe waste is easily available from nearly any construction site. In many urban settings also from public waste management sites.
The pipes are light and easy to transport, even by cargobike. They are safe to handle, also for children and can be cut by use of handsaw.
Soil and seeds are cheap and often available from other gardens - hence bringing people together.
From location to location, we have experience with teaching children, teen-agers, young people, adults and seniors to construct and plant gardens. In a blink of and eye they worked together and learned from each other. It is very easily transferred from one place/group to another.
Any city dwelling, tiny or mighty. Any kindergarden, school, nursing home, collegium, apartment construction in any city. Plenty and plenty of city-citizens, who have little or no experience with sticking their fingers in soil, feeling, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting a growing herb, might gain the opportunity to do so, and thereby connect their own body to urban nature, the place they live and some of the people they share this space with.
The project is very simple to convey - just sharing our photos via social media will do much.
Furthermore, in different cultural settings, a large number of different organizations might adopt and support: Churches, scouts, plant-enthusiastic fora, social housing, entrepreneurs (providing the pipes) etc. A person or organisation to initiate an activity is always an important key to support positive development, and make roots catch foothold.
A local solution: An urban garden in a city, where people live, can be copy-pasted anywhere in Europe.
Connecting to nature, to own senses, to each other round the growing of plants, is much needed. Connecting to nature strengthens our physical, mental and social well being.
Growing your own is typically only on option for wealthy people, owing their own garden or land. This type of project has the potential to give us all ac
Urbanisation is set to continue at a rapid pace in the coming decades. Already today, 55% of the world’s population – which is expected to reach 9 billion in 2050 – live in urban areas, and up to 80% of all food produced globally is consumed in cities. With a growing global population that will primarily settle in urban areas, more and more agricultural land will be converted into dwellings, roads etc. As the demand for food in 2050 will be 60% greater than today, a conflict between Sustainable Development Goals 2 (Zero Hunger) and 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) is imminent.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, urban farming can make cities’ food supply more resilient and thus contribute to a better trade-off between the two SDGs. Reuse of discarded plastic products also help mitigate the challenges of plastic waste, which are seen in virtually all parts of the world.
