UK: How to recreate a Revival garden
Gardening became a popular and, crucially, productive occupation, the food from 1.4 million allotment plots supplementing the rations that lasted 14 years from 1940.
By Francesca Clarke
Goodwood
Dec 9, 2021
Excerpt:
Shining a spotlight on wartime horticultural endeavours, the Revival saw Goodwood’s very own landscaping and planting guru Steve Christopher recreate a working 1940s allotment on site. At 600 sq ft, the Victory Garden was around a quarter of the size of a standard 10-rod allotment.
The project was an ambitious undertaking, brought to life by a combination of thousands of seeds sown in Steve’s own greenhouse and on the Goodwood Estate, a restored Ferguson T-20 tractor, numerous actors in full 1940s regalia, and plenty of old-fashioned blood, sweat and tears.
In the 1940s, rations and grow-your-own made the nation the healthiest it had ever been. Communities strived and struggled together. Mark Lang, of UK gardening-for-health charity Thrive, agrees: “A key part of Dig for Victory was keeping the morale of the population high. Gardening at home or on an allotment today has similar benefits and has proven links to reducing stress, anxiety and depression.”
Equally, when we grow our own, using ‘Spades not Ships’, we’re shrinking our carbon footprint, reducing food waste, providing food and shelter for wildlife, and cutting down on the use of harmful chemicals involved in food production.
