Autumn Update

The summer might be over, but the garden still looks stunning!

As Summer gives way to Autumn, the garden has remained as beautiful as ever, with the sensory garden seemingly to have an unending flowering season, set against the wonderful backdrop of tall, swaying grasses. Every time I visit the garden, something has changed, with not just the way the established plants have filled out and grown, but also the new projects that we have embarked upon and new areas we have developed.

We are particularly pleased that we now have a path and a dedicated gate connecting us to Broadwater Care Home. This means the residents of the care home can visit the garden even when it is closed to the public, and can make their way to us very safely without having to go out into the road. The community at the care home has been so supportive of the garden from the outset, both in terms of helping us obtain the lease from the council and through financial support with a generous donation towards our building. It is wonderful to see the residents enjoying this beautiful space as part of our community.

The volunteers have also been hard at work digging and planting a new bed next to the pond and establishing the edge of the garden with some wonderful natrual rocks which were kindly donated to us, which will then allow us to plant up and naturalise the edges of the pond. It is fabulous to see this feature develop, and exciting to think about what it might look like by this time next year. So many thanks to our garden designer, Karen Blight, for being our guiding light as we bring this feature to life!

A Call for Trustees

When we registered the garden with the charity commission, we started with four trustees, our chair of trustees, Helen Farmer, Dr Karen Jones, Deepa Craig and Dr Martin Brunet. We now feel the time is right to increase the number of trustees and so we would love to hear from anyone who would like to consider joining us on the board. Trustees are responsible for the key decisions and operations of the charity and we are interested to hear from anyone who feels this role might suit them, and especially from anyone with experience working in the financial or charitable sector.

 If you would like to know more, you can see the full description of the role and download an application form on the Trustee page of our website.

Green Hub

We are delighted to be setting up a new project, working with the Green Hub, a fabulous project based in Surrey and Hampshire supporting young people through community gardening. They do not currently have a base in Godalming and so we are very excited that they would like to set up a project for us in our Farncombe garden. They are looking for local volunteers to support this work - might this interest you? You can find out all about it here.

Dates for your diary

Quiz Night

Once Christmas is over and the New Year has started we will all need something to look forward to in those darker winter months - and what could be better than the FCG quiz night to cheer the soul?! This has been such a fantastic event in previous years and our very own Andy Jones is already working hard at putting together the perfect quiz for us, which will be held on Friday 23rd January at 7pm, at the Wilfred Noyce centre.

Hold the date in your diary for now and start putting your team together (teams of around 8-10 would be ideal). There will be a donations bar with alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks available, to go with any snacks you would like to bring. We will let you know when we are ready to take bookings!

Christmas Period

As usual, there are some days over the Chrsitmas period where we will not be open for our usual open sessions due to the holiday season. The dates when the garden will not open in the usual way are:

Wednesday 24th December

Friday 26th December

Saturday 27th December

Wednesday 31st December

Friday 2nd January

We will be back open as usual on Saturday 3rd January.

Enjoy the autumn and notice as many leaves turning colour as you can, and have a fabulous Christmas. We hope the New Year starts well for you, and hope to see you at the garden soon!