Village Raw - ISSUE 9

VILLAGE RAW
PARTNER CONTENT
A GREAT
WASTE OF TIME
OmVed is introducing more garden
workshops in the spring that will
teach everything from growing
food to composting waste.
Words by Carla Parks.
Photos by Thomas Broadhead.
Tucked away behind Highgate High Street, down an alleyway
that appears to lead to nowhere, is OmVed Gardens. It’s a green
space dedicated to re-establishing our connection with nature
in the middle of a dense city. A light-filled greenhouse with a
minimalist kitchen acts as a focal point for events, workshops
and occasional exhibitions open to the community. It’s from
here that Vicky Chown sips tea on a bright winter’s day, a dome
of delicate blue sky arched overhead. I join a small group of people
gathered around her, braving the bitter cold to learn more
about composting.
It’s OmVed’s last workshop of the year but the plan is to introduce
more in early spring - to be led by Vicky who is a trained medical
herbalist and runs the community gardens in Queen’s Wood.
Blinking into the morning sun, Vicky tells us that we learn best by
doing, so we are going to be building a compost and mucking in as
much as possible.
Karen Leason, who runs OmVed Gardens, joins us and explains
some of their ambitious plans that include building a community
seed bank and utilising the new kitchen garden growing below
the greenhouse as much as possible. “My feeling is that people
are keen to grow things, but some of us actually don’t even have
the basics,” Karen says. She envisages OmVed as a collaboration
between humans and nature. Vicky has been brought on board
because of her extensive knowledge of plants and her collaborative
approach.
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Vicky says that the focus of the workshops will be on learning
about where our food comes from, based on the seasons. One
aim is to grow a variety of crops, so there will be an emphasis
on slightly more unusual UK-based plants and keeping a regular
diary to record how well certain plants respond. “We want people
to learn the process of gardening, from composting to sowing
seeds, to harvesting and saving seeds - and to just get everyone
to do as much food growing as they can,” she explains.
Composting, Vicky continues, has big benefits that include
knowing your waste will not be going to landfill, as well as providing
a nourishing environment for plants to grow. “All the scraps
are going into the garden to be composted and put into your
plants again. You can then enjoy them as flowers, vegetables, a
healthy lawn or fruit trees. It’s a nice, closed loop cycle,” she says.
There are different methods for composting but we’re learning
about an open compost. The general rule is to have a ratio
of one part green waste to two parts brown waste. Green waste
adds nitrogen to the compost pile, encouraging microbe activity.
Brown waste provides structure and is carbon rich. You alternate
your green and brown layers, ensuring each one is about three to
six inches deep, making a “compost lasagne”. You leave this for a
few weeks and then turn or aerate the pile. In the summer you will
need to do this more frequently than in the winter months.
It’s surprisingly physical work since we need to move a huge
pile of leaves. We add some of our green waste and that can in-
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clude coffee grounds, nettles, grass clippings and raw kitchen
waste. Our brown pile consists of old lavender twigs, cardboard
and dry leaves. We also see a ‘bokashi’ compost, a Japanese
method that uses fermentation and can be kept inside. After two
hours we’re ready to call it a day, warming ourselves with another
hot drink and admiring our compost pile.•
VICKY’S DOS AND DON’TS FOR COMPOSTING:
Do make the compost pile as big as possible.
The bigger it is, the faster it will break down.
Do add in a variety of mixed things as you would
with your own diet.
Don’t put perennial weeds in your compost pile.
The weed roots will spread to your garden.
Don’t put cooked food on an open-pile compost,
but you can add cooked food to a bokashi system.
OmVed will be running a series of workshops starting in the spring, including composting.
Check the website for updates and sign up to their newsletter at: www.omvedgardens.com
or follow: @omvedgardens on Instagram