On the weekend of 18th and 19th June over 200 gardens, squares and other green spaces across London were open as part of Open Garden Squares Weekend. This year our two historic burial grounds were part of this popular London wide event. It was a chance to highlight these two beautiful spaces and to raise money for burial ground maintenance.
Judy East and I would like to thank all the volunteers who acted as stewards and welcomers, baked cakes and helped with the catering. A big thank you too to Chris Money and Marilyn Brookes for the wonderful children’s packs they created and the way they enthused our young visitors; to Sue Kwok who organized and co-ordinated the delicious refreshments and to Jenny Bunn and the gardening team for all their hard work and all the extra Saturdays they did to get our burial grounds looking so beautiful.
We had over 250 visitors, served over 170 cups of tea, gave out lots of self guided tour leaflets, and took 65 people on guided tours.
Another equally important part of this event was that we were open and available to share the space with people who I think valued this. There were some very precious individual experiences – like the young woman who was looking for where her father’s ashes were interred that Judy was able to help; the first child and his father who took a children’s activity pack who didn’t want to leave and who will hopefully remember the fun he had; the mother who came after 50 years to revisit where her son was baptised who Peter spoke to; the conversation I had with Sari and Anthony Hutton’s son and his partner who came to plant a geranium on Sari’s birthday to remember her; all the people who came for tea and welcomed the chance to chat – these encounters were important and wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t been taking part in Open Garden Squares Weekend. Maybe we need to think of other opportunities to be open and available in this way.