Welcome to Cultivate London’s digital newsletter! Read on for the latest news from the ground…
Cultivate London: Best Business for Apprentices and Employment for Young People
We are pleased to announce that on the 10th of October, Cultivate London was awarded a Hounslow Business Award for “Best Business for Apprentices and Employment for Young People” (try saying that 10 times fast). We were also highly commended in the “Best Green Business” category. The awards ceremony was held at the Holiday Inn at Brentford Lock, and we had a fabulous time! Thank you to everyone who was involved in putting on the event.
Brent Way site: Complete!
After many months of hard work, and with much help from teams from Rackspace Ltd, British Land and Price Waterhouse Cooper, we have finally completed work on our third site! It is just off of Brent Way, in Brentford (behind the Magpie and Crown pub, for you CAMRA folk). We are very excited about growing here, and can’t wait to get it up to full capacity in the spring. We are already harvesting kale and salad from it, and plan to grow much more there in the coming growing season. Check out this youtube video for a great little film done for us on site:
Many thanks to Vibol Moeung for putting the film together. Also, thanks must be extended to Housing Pathways, the Big Lottery Fund, the Greater London Authority Food Board and the Plunkett Foundation for providing the funding that made the building of this site possible.
Trainee Successes
A big congratulations to trainees Adam, Chris, Henry, Kyle, Tyler and Wayne who successfully completed their traineeship with us this month, after starting with us in June. After spending three months working hard on Cultivate London’s sites, they then undertook one-month long work placements as part of the program. Many thanks to Walpole Park (Ealing) and Chiswick House and Gardens for hosting these! Our guys had a wonderful time working with you.
All trainees are leaving us with an award in horticulture from Green Corridor, a qualification in health and safety and (hopefully!) some new friends and great memories! We will miss having them around, as they were a great group. Best of luck to all of them.
We are now greatly enjoying working with our autumn trainees, who will finish with us in December. We have really enjoyed working with all of our trainees this year – a bunch of fantastic people! Congratulations to you all.
Cultivate London Christmas Wreaths – Place an order, or come along to a workshop!
We are excited to announce that we will be selling beautiful, natural Christmas wreaths again this year! Created in partnership with Sunnyside Rural Trust, they will be available to order from the 1st of November. They will be custom made and ready for pick up from the 13th of December. Order forms will be going out shortly.
Would you rather make your own? We are spicing it up a little this year and for the first time will be running a wreath making workshop at the Docking Station in Brentford. The event will be held on the 13th of December, from 6 – 8pm (session 1) and 8 – 10pm (session 2). For twenty pounds only you will get to learn how to create your very own wreath, while enjoying some mince pies, hot drinks and great company. All materials provided.
Job Vacancy: General Manager
Cultivate London is sorry to announce that General Manager Adrienne Attorp will be leaving us in March to return home to pursue her career in Canada. As such, we are currently looking to hire a new General Manager.
The role is for an energetic passionate, goal-oriented person who will help Cultivate London’s dedicated team build our existing income base as well as develop our youth training programme.
If you or someone you know is interested in applying for the position and becoming part of our exciting, multi-award winning social enterprise, then head over to our website to apply. You can also check out the posting on environmentjob.co.uk.
Cultivate London Welcomes Three New Directors
We are very excited to announce that in September we elected three new members to our Board of Directors: Karen Liebrich, Sara Novakovic and Angela Rodney Evans. We are very excited to be working with them as they bring a wealth of diverse experience to the Board.
Karen is a local author and historian who is Co-founder of Abundance London, an award-winning project to harvest the seasonal glut of local fruit which would otherwise go unpicked. She is also a Special Advisor of Chelsea Fringe, and is a trustee of the Hammersmith Community Gardens Association. Last year she was awarded an MBE for services to horticulture to education.
Sara is the owner of Oliver’s Wholefood Store in Kew. She opened Oliver’s in 1989 with a desire to make organic food more accessible. Prior to doing so, she worked as a chef in a vegetarian restaurant, had a company selling fresh organic orange juice, taught dance and aerobics, and worked at the Institute for Optimum Nutrition.
Angela is a Management Consultant who has over 18 years of experience successfully planning, developing and delivering services in the fields of regeneration, employment and training, youth work, education and community engagement within the charitable and public sectors.
We are looking forward to working with them over the coming years!
COMMUNITY LINKS
Cultivate London has the great fortune of being able to collaborate with with a number of community groups and organisations around London. This month we would like to highlight teapigs, who are setting about ridding the world of terrible tea from right here in Brentford. Since starting only seven years ago (their seventh birthday is on the 1st on November!) they have grown into a hugely successful business, selling a wide range of incredibly delicious whole leaf teas to customers around the world. Adrienne is personally obsessed with their Licorice Mint.
We have been working closely with them for quite a few months now, and it has been great fun. Each week one “teapig” comes down and works with us on site for an afternoon, getting stuck in with whatever might need doing at Cultivate London on the day! They have been blogging about some of their experiences here. In addition, they supplied us with some great auction items for our fundraising dinner back in April, which was hugely appreciated. We look forward to continuing to work with them, and recommend that if you haven’t tried their tea yet, do so!
UPCOMING MARKETS
Is the thought of the drab winter season getting you down? No need to fear, simply come pay us a visit at London Farmers Markets slots Ealing and Queens Park and we will help you fight of the winter blues with some fabulous autumn and winter -flowering plants! We have some beautiful pansies, primulas and chrysanthemums on the go at the moment, and beautiful bulbs are on their way. And it is still not too late to stick in some winter veg – we still have kale and chard if yours hasn’t quite made it!
November market dates are listed below. Also, keep an eye out for us at upcoming Christmas markets at St. Faith’s Church (26th November), Brentford Market (December – TBA), and Brentford School for Girls (18th December)!
- Saturday 2nd November – Ealing Market
- Sunday 3rd November – Queens Park Market
- Saturday 9th November – Ealing Farmers Market
- Saturday 16th November – Ealing Market
- Sunday 17th November – Queens Park Market
- Saturday 23rd November – Ealing Market
- Tuesday 26th November – St Faith’s Christmas Fair: 6 – 9pm
We can’t wait to see you there!
AVAILABLE THIS MONTH
- Veg (9cm): curly kale, calvo nero kale, chard (bright lights, perpetual), radicchio, sorrel
- Herbs (9cm and 1L): oregano, dill, mint, chives, parsley, sage, thyme, verbena
- Flowers (9cm and 1L): pansies, violas, primulas, salvia, lupins, wallflowers, chrysanthemums
- Organic Farmyard Manure, 50L bag (Well rotted and ready to add to beds for planting)
£6 per bag/£5 per bag, bulk buy of 5 bags or more/£4 per bag, bulk buy of 10 bags or more
- Pro 50/50 potting compost, 75L bag
- 50% peat reduced compost for seedlings and potting of young fast growing plants. Good nutrient balance and water absorbency
£10 per bag/£9 per bag, bulk buy of 5 bags or more/£8 per bag : bulk buy of 10 bags or more
- Small pots (9cm for potting on seedlings)
- Pack of 100 (loose) – £3.50
Interested in any of our products? Please contact Denis Brown VIA EMAIL, call 079 0676 3908 or visit us at any of the above markets.
Volunteer With Us!
We are always looking for volunteers to come work with us. There is never a shortage of tasks to be done at either site, from sowing, planting and harvesting, to office-based tasks such as marketing, website maintenance and media relations.
If you have a few spare hours in the week and would like to come get your hands dirty at Cultivate London (either literally, at one of our sites, or figuratively, in the office), PLEASE GET IN TOUCH.