#dalstoneasterncurvegarden

[easterncurvegarden]

Farewell to our Alliums for another year…We’ve loved them and so have the bees!

Many thanks to Alex Bogdan for her beautiful photos.

#allium #purple #bulb #flowersforbees #dalstoneasterncurvegarden

[all-neon-like]

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A post shared by Greg Haughton (@gregjhaughton)

I just booked my first post-lockdown gig 🎫 to see @mesadorm with @fawinter so my Song of the Day is ‘Let’s Leap’. I’m looking forward to September 1st at @dalstongarden with @woodburnermusic @babylegsrecords @theleap_org #songoftheday #mesadorm #dalstoneasterncurvegarden#letsleap #letthemusicplay https://www.instagram.com/p/CDdeQJPH8k1/?igshid=n43g5meyytns

[noemikandler-photography]

© Noemi Kandler

[lillymarques]

Wild times to come #dalstoneasterncurvegarden #garden #shades #nature #green #wild #balance (v místě Dalston Eastern Curve Garden)

[dramaforall]

We are 4 years old!

This week we started celebrating by watching videos and listening to music.

Made by us!

The video was of our performance in January called ‘I am an artist’.

The music was made by us a few weeks ago when visiting the Dalston Eastern Curve Garden.

We had a great time writing and drawing all the bits we liked most.

We have decided to celebrate for a whole month, so stay tuned for more news.

Thank you to everyone who has performed, supported and watched our group grow. Here’s to another 4 years!

Drama For All

[patriceblanchot]

Everyone wants instant everything, and they want instant success, but I always think you should treat things in the arts like a garden, and let them grow. Penelope Keith #garden #urban #dalston #london #wall #love #tweegram #instagood #bestoftheday #instacool #follow #colorful #style #swag #allshots #amazing #smile #instalike #tb #picoftheday #instadaily #dalstoneasterncurvegarden #urbangarden #penelopekeith #quote #quoteoftheday (at Dalston Eastern Curve Garden) https://www.instagram.com/p/B14hqz8A0UX/?igshid=e35yne83f4uc

[theculturalexpose]

Preach. #dalstoneasterncurvegarden #plantlife http://ift.tt/2sH7Hlx

[lukasnovo]

Keep cities WILD! Dalston Eastern Curve Garden, bee & hippie friendly place, was built on an old railway line and it has a great wooden pavilion by EXYZT architects. Hackney council is now doing consultations about redevelopment of this area - potential danger! Let the council and the mayor know your opinions. #keepcitieswild #urbanwild #dalstoneasterncurvegarden #hackney #redevelopment #exyzt #london #londonlife #londononly #urbanjungle #woodenarchitecture #igresdaily #photoftheday #nofilter #vsco #eastermcurvegarden #eastlondon #northlondon #kingslandroad #dalstonjunction #dalston #popupcity #exyztarchitects #beefriendly #welivetoexplore #awesome_photographers #wanderlustflower #londoninbloom#exploremore #whatthehellarethesehastagsanyway (at Dalston Eastern Curve Garden)

[sueandspike-blog]

This annual event is truly magical. Do visit and take the kids! #festivaloflights #dalston #communitygarden #dalstoneasterncurvegarden #dalstoneasterncurve

[easterncurvegarden]

'Its tickly feet feel like velcro' 

That was one of the responses from children from Dalston’s Holy Trinity Primary School who were encountering a stag beetle for the first time.

Over recent weeks they’ve been working with artist educators Laura Halliwell and Corinne Beaty and author and nature educator Michael Holland to explore the diversity of mini-beasts that have made their home in the Garden. They’ve been carefully lifting logs to look for their habitats, shaking tree branches onto a white sheet to see what creatures live there, observing ants marching up and down tree trunks and looking for more signs of minibeast activity, such as nibbled leaves. Inspired by their discoveries they’ve been making their own lady-bird puppets, and drawing minibeasts from up close observation. 

This week children were particularly excited to discover a stag beetle living under a log and some even drummed up the courage to let it sit on their hands commenting on how 'its tickly feet feel like velcro'. We are delighted that not only is this priority species now thriving at the Curve Garden among the dead wood log piles that are part of our drive to create diverse habitats, but that Hackney children are learning to love this globally endangered species, as well as less ‘glamorous’ mini-beasts like woodlice.    

Our annual ‘Inspired by Nature’ programme with Holy Trinity Primary School is very special for us and for them. Most of the children don’t have their own gardens, so we love to see them returning to visit us year after year, often bringing family and friends to show off ‘their garden’ to them. Long may their joy in nature in the city continue!

#outdoorlearning#natureinthecity#dalstoneasterncurvegarden#biodiversity#minibeasts#hackneykids

[easterncurvegarden]

The sun has been shining today, the official first day of Spring, after a week of rain and even hailstorms, so it seems a good time to share a snapshot of the plants we are enjoying in Dalston Curve Garden right now. 

Today is St David’s Day, a day of national celebration for Wales, and as Daffodils are the Welsh national flower, first on our list is Narcissus ‘Tete a Tete’. This is the earliest of the Daffodils that emerge here and this year they’ve been flowering since the beginning of February. We aim to have Daffodil varieties in flower one after the other, right through to the end of April, planted in the ground and in tins and containers. 

Our tins of yellow Daffodils look good next to purple Crocus. As well as planting them in containers, we grow Crocus tommasinianus ‘Ruby Giant’ under trees, and in our ‘Bee Bed’. We love the way Crocus open their ‘faces’ when the sun is shining, but as we’ve had so many overcast days of late, sadly they’ve remained more closed than open this year!

Several years ago we planted a tiny clump of Dog Violet (Viola riviniana) and have been happy to see them spread more and more ever since. Although the pretty little flowers are not scented like those of Sweet Violet, they are attractive to bees and as their leaves are evergreen, Dog Violets do a good job of covering bare ground all year round.   

The Hellebores have started to clump up nicely in our ‘woodland’ bed. Lovely as they are, their downward facing ‘sulky’ flowers are best appreciated from a low crouching position. Alongside them, we are enjoying the spotty leaves of Pulmonaria (Lungwort) Their strange bi-coloured, pink & purple flowers are a good source of nectar for any Bumble or Solitary Bees emerging from hibernation on warm days in early Spring, when there are not many other flowers available. 

Although Alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens) can take over if not kept in check, it is another Spring flowering plant that’s good for several bee species and other pollinators, so we are happy to make it welcome in some parts of the Garden. Bees are also supported by the unusual dusky pink Primroses that were donated to us last year from a garden in Wales and are settling happily in their new Hackney home. 

With so many beautiful flowering bulbs and plants emerging after winter, this really is an uplifting time in the Garden. Many thanks to our hard-working team of volunteers who planted hundreds of bulbs last Autumn that are now bringing so much joy to Dalston in early Spring.  

All photos by Sandra Keating and copyright Dalston Eastern Curve Garden

[easterncurvegarden]

Spring in all its glory has come to Dalston Curve Garden in recent weeks, with fresh leaves unfurling, the delicate beauty of Wild Cherry blossom and new drifts of Spring-flowering bulbs emerging every day. We have been very lucky to have photographers Sandra Keating and Alex Bogdan here to record this beautiful botanical moment in time.

Spring-flowering bulbs make the most of the light beneath the bare stems of deciduous trees before the ground beneath them is shaded out by their new leaves and in recent years we have planted more and more of these plants in our ‘woodland’ style beds. We love dainty Erythronium ‘Pagoda’ which produces little nodding, star-like flowers with sulphur-yellow petals. Their nearby companion Pulmonaria has blue flowers and interesting spotty leaves and is welcomed on warm March and April days by bees searching for nectar.

Everyone at the Curve Garden loves tulips and we plant hundreds more every Autumn!  We don’t plant ours in the ground, as they never look quite right here, but instead we create a glorious display of pots and containers. We’ll be sharing photos of this year’s April display next week, but for now we are shining light on one little early flowering variety. Tulip ‘Turkestanica’ is named, not surprisingly after Turkey, its place of origin. It flowers in March, way ahead of most of our other varieties and is a beautiful wild-looking species, with up to twelve star-shaped flowers.

Visitors to the Curve Garden often ask ‘What Is that blue plant that looks like Bluebells’? The answer is Muscari latifolium (Grape Hyacinth) which we plant in drifts among all the yellow Narcissi (Daffodils) and best of all, the bees love them! 

We are in love with Leucojum aestivum the wonderfully but rather confusingly named ‘Summer Snowflake’ which flowers in Spring!  A member of the Daffodil family, it has dainty white bells with green ‘dots’. We grow the variety ‘Gravetye Giant’ and this year we planted it in locations all over the garden. 

Spring really is all about Daffodils or Narcissi and we grow about seven varieties here, some directly in the soil and others in pots and tins, aiming to get successional flowering from February to late April. Our favourites include dainty little ‘Hawera’ which we’ve combined with Summer Snowflakes under trees, the delicately scented ‘Pipit’ and for the first time this year ‘Thalia’ which has a long flowering period and is great for vases.  

Thanks to Gardener Emma Rey and to all of our volunteers for their hard work from September to December last year planting all of these beautiful bulbs! And we are also grateful to volunteer Eco Zhang for her lovely hand-painted signs identifying our plants that are of special interest now.  

The Garden is open from 11am every day over the Easter weekend and til 10pm Friday - Sunday so why not come in and enjoy the botanical abundance?

All photographs copyright of Dalston Eastern Curve Garden

[easterncurvegarden]

Wow! What a day it has been at the Garden! If you missed out today, there’s still a chance to carve a pumpkin tomorrow! All the carved pumpkins will stay in the Garden for our first big lantern light up tomorrow evening! Here’s what you need to know; 

- Carving tomorrow is between 12-3pm

- The Garden closes to the public between 4pm - 6pm for our volunteers to prepare for the lantern light up.

- Carvers from this weekend have special entry (with the ticket we give you) 6pm - 8pm

- Dalston Pumpkin Lantern Show is open to all 8pm - 10pm

We can’t wait to see what you create! Here are some highlights from last year’s Dalston Pumpkin Lantern Festival 🎃

[easterncurvegarden]

If you are carving a pumpkin lantern for Halloween and are looking for inspiration, check out this small selection of creative carvings from our 1,100 #dalstonpumpkins! They were all crafted by the hundreds of children, young people and adults that took part in this year’s Dalston Pumpkin Lantern Festival. Over 20,000 visitors have enjoyed eight magical light-up nights, when all of the lanterns illuminated the Garden. We programme the Festival each year to coincide with half-term so that lots of children can come along so this meant that this year’s Festival officially ended on 28 October. However the good news is that ‘due to popular demand’ all of the lanterns that still remain will be lit up for one last pumpkin party for Halloween night, 31 October, 5-10pm. 

Thanks to Alex Sutherland, Sandra Keating and our new contributor Barry Pumpkin for these beautiful photographs of this year's festival. Copyright of Dalston Eastern Curve Garden

[easterncurvegarden]

Hackney residents can ‘Take a Pause’ from everyday stresses and strains by stepping into Dalston Curve Garden on Wednesday 16 May, 6-8.30pm for MIND’s free annual evening of wellness.  

It’s part of Mental Health Awareness Week, which this year has a special focus on stress. 

You can try out Tai Chi, yoga, massage and mindfullness and meet local organisations including Hackney Herbal, Hackney Volunteer Centre, Shoreditch Trust, Green Gym, & Derman.

You can sign up to this year’s ‘Take a Pause’ free event here: https://bit.ly/2jTJths

Here’s how last year’s ‘Take a Pause’ event was recorded by photographer Sandra Keating. 

[easterncurvegarden]

Light, warmth and connection - lantern-making mornings at the Garden. 

Every winter we light up the Garden with our ‘Festival of Light, displaying hand-crafted lanterns, made by local residents and community groups. In this tough year, when we could all do with some light, colour and sparkle, we have been making magical lanterns with one of the groups of older residents, who have been meeting here regularly since the summer.

Artist-educator Laura Halliwell who runs the lantern-making project, describes the experience: 

‘’After introducing the participants to the concept and the techniques of cutting out silhouette designs in black paper, we got busy creating individual designs for paper-bag lanterns, with a healthy dose of laughter, chat and storytelling thrown in, all the while adhering to COVID safety guidelines.

Now we are exploring the fascinating local history of the Loddiges Plant Nursery and ‘largest hothouse in the world’, which was once located right here in Hackney. This incredible history is inspiring some of our lantern designs, which are based on the ‘Wardian cases’ that in the 19th century were used to transport tropical plants across the world. The use of wonderfully illustrated botanical books have not only inspired our paper-cutting art, but have also led to story-telling about plants that some of the older people remember growing up with in the Caribbean. We are really looking forward to delving deeper into the Loddiges story in our community and education work throughout 2021.

I have so enjoyed sharing my Tuesday mornings with this group of very special people who are all collaborating together, sharing great stories and knowledge, amazing skills and talents and wonderful words of encouragement for each other and for me too - we are all learning and laughing a lot!”

Several of the participants are so inspired by the project, that they continue to work on their paper art at home. One member of the group, Fay, who is already a skilled craftsperson, describes her experience of meeting regularly at the Garden and now making lanterns: 

“It has this feeling of happiness - it’s alive and green. It’s just a special atmosphere in this place. This lantern-making activity saved me. Before this I was seeing all the interesting craft activities people were doing on social media and it was getting me down. Now I am working on these lanterns. I just love it. I can’t wait to see all of our Loddiges lanterns lit up in the Garden”

With the help of extra cosy sleeping bag blankets, hot water bottles and warming bowls of porridge, we are determined that our community mornings and special projects will continue throughout the winter months, keeping people inspired, happy and connected with each other, as well as with nature. You can help support our community mornings by donating to our crowdfunder at: https://www.gofundme.com/f/save-dalston-curve-garden

Thanks to Sandra Keating for her beautiful photographs recording our Loddiges lantern-making project