2014 New Garden Campaign

GrowMemphis provides funding and training for neighborhood residents who want to create and sustain community gardens or urban farms in their neighborhoods. Each garden is as unique as the neighborhood in which it is found. Gardens eliminate blight, provide fresh, healthy food, create a safe space for community building, and often provide economic opportunity for neighborhoods.

Annually, GrowMemphis solicits applications from neighborhood residents and institutions and prioritizes them based on need and community leadership. Each garden that is funded receives all of the tools, supplies, and infrastructure it needs to get started. After receiving funding, each new partner garden goes through our “Community Gardening 101” training, which helps new gardeners feel comfortable with organic horticulture. More importantly, this training prepares gardeners to do the community work that makes a community garden successful. 

First, GrowMemphis solicits applications from neighborhood residents who have a project idea.

Next, our staff prioritize applications based on community need and neighborhood leadership.

Once projects are selected, new gardeners go through Community Gardening 101, a training program designed to train new gardeners in organic horticulture as well as the community-based skills they need to run a successful garden or farm. This training also helps gardeners create a successful project design that best meets the needs of their neighborhoods

After training, GrowMemphis helps new gardeners purchase supplies and infrastructure and works with them to plan a successful ground-breaking celebration.

Finally, partner gardens continue to receive technical assistance, training, seeds and starter plants to ensure their projects continue to be successful.

Community gardening projects address a variety of community issues in creative ways, and the impact of each garden is unique to the neighborhood in which it is found. These projects not only eliminate vacant, blighted property and provide healthy, fresh food to neighborhood residents, but they also build community pride and create a safe space for community building. As neighborhoods engage in these projects, it is our hope that the gardens become a tool for broader community engagement around issues of environmental injustice, food insecurity, crime, and poverty. Community gardens cannot solve these problems, but they can serve as the catalyst for residents to take back ownership of their communities.