Growing WELL: Connecting Communities Through Urban Gardens

Most people connect the concept of biophilia with beautiful natural  views, lots of houseplants or design elements that mimic the real world. But it’s a term that also applies to green spaces — especially those that provide shared nourishment and community. 

Save for a brief wartime period when victory gardens saw lawns and flowerbeds turned over to food production, the planting in our public parks and gardens is often ornamental. Things are changing, though, as the concept of edible landscapes has begun to capture the public imagination.

It’s a movement that has the power to transform our cities. Creating communal areas capable of producing food for residents – everything from tiny sidewalk herb boxes to large-scale urban agricultural projects – could offer us all a practical way of reconnecting with nature, reframing our relationship with food and creating a powerful sense of shared ownership of the planet. 

In my experience, tending even the tiniest garden can boost mental, physical and dietary health: I’ve certainly found solace in my plants during the pandemic, taking joy in every new bud and bloom. If you can share a planting project with your friends and neighbors, I believe this joy can be magnified many times over.

When I moved into my condo in DC there was a tiny but very overgrown plot of land between the street and the sidewalk in front of my place. I cleared the plot with the help of my neighbors’ kids – who had never grown anything before. We planted a “pizza” garden that first year, raising basil, tomatoes, oregano and mint for mojitos (virgin or otherwise). The harvest was so bountiful we put up homemade signs encouraging others to help themselves.

From my perch on the second floor, I delighted every time a neighbor stopped to take a sprig of mint or a few cherry tomatoes. What was even more rewarding was that my public plot takeover was catching. Other neighbors were clearing the public plots in front of their houses to plant fruit and vegetables for our communal pantry, or using their front stoops to grow herbs. Some said that it had never occurred to them to grow their own food in their own yards.

We know that physical and social environments have a dramatic impact on our health and well-being practices but often we don’t think deeply about how and why this happens. When I was leading the Center for Green Schools, I worked with Atasha James who won a grant to create an edible school yard and outdoor teaching kitchen at the public school she ran in one of DC’s lowest-income neighborhoods. Some of the elders from the community she surveyed were dubious about the project: they believed that growing your own food was a mark of poverty and a signal that you couldn't afford to feed your own family. 

This perspective was so striking that I don’t think I’ll ever forget it because it so poignantly highlights some of the things that get in the way of us living the healthiest version of our lives. A big part of the work that we have to do isn’t just about making healthy choices easier choices, it’s also about shifting norms and perceptions.

Thankfully, there are plenty of examples for us to follow. Architects, designers and planners can take their inspiration from the many thousands of community-based food projects that are transforming communities all over the world.

At Chicago’s Gary Comer Youth Center the roof-top garden not only supplies the cafeteria with fresh produce but is also used to educate the community about healthy foods and the environment. In the densely populated Malaysian city of Iskandar Puteri, the remarkable five-acre Edible Park provides visitors with all-important access to sustainably grown fruit and vegetables. In a small town in the north of England, non-profit cooperative Incredible Edible Todmorden has created dozens of fruit and vegetable plots – including a healing apothecary garden – with produce that’s free for anyone who wants to harvest it.

When victory gardens were in fashion during the 1940s, some saw them as a stunt – a way to get more people involved in the war effort. In fact, so many people committed to the project that historians estimate that, at its peak, almost 40 percent of the country’s fresh produce was coming from around 20 million home, school and community gardens across the US. 

This shows that even small projects can make a big difference – if there are enough of them. Establishing more edible parks and gardens could deliver multiple benefits directly to communities in need, creating opportunities for exercise, social interaction, friendly cooperation and real-life learning for all ages. By reimagining the urban landscape, we could choose to prioritize affordable, sustainable and equitable community development that actually improves neighborhoods over the long term, creating a green infrastructure that benefits all, regardless of social or economic status. 

My neighbor’s kids are all grown up now, but they still stop by their grandma’s house from time to time and pause to pull a sprig of mint from the plot before heading inside. 

?Rachel Hodgdon is President and CEO of the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), a public benefit corporation and the world’s leading organization focused on deploying people first places to advance a global culture of health.