The Village Garden Project

Most of our volunteers and community groups get involved at Innermost because of the community connection and feel-good factors. 

Gardens and shared connection spaces bring people from all walks of life together in a way that makes the community stronger. They bring mental and physical wellbeing benefits, and provide a green space which is increasingly important as living becomes more intensified. 

In the summer of 2019/20, in collaboration with Wellington City Council, we began a project that we hoped would tell a better story to city administrators about the many benefits of community gardens. We wanted the story to be more than food waste diverted from landfill and kgs of produce grown. 

Through the Summer Scholar programme, Innermost was used as a test case for research and the development of an impact that attempted to ‘bottle the vibe’ 

The intention of the project was to share this with other community gardens around Aotearoa and beyond, so a separate website was created to present all of the research and data. The numbers from Innermost continue to be added to the tool, to capture a visual image of out impact, like the starburst chart below. 

The result was The Village Garden Project: Empowering community gardeners with the tools to tell their story …