What is The Garden Project…

The Garden Project is an independent multi-media documentary project about urban agriculture in communities of color. Over the course of ten months six families from low income, working class African American, Latina and Pacific Islander will go through the process of starting gardens in their yards and apartments. The goal is to demonstrate how families of every size, economic background, living in homes of various sizes and types and juggling even the busiest schedules can have fun growing and consuming their own chemical-free produce.  Each family will cultivate a different variety of crops based on their health profile and what would make healthy additions to their current eating habits. The families will meet monthly as a group to discuss their successes, failures and what they are learning in a public forum.  These monthly meetings will also serve as public outreach for the project. At the meetings community members will have access to information about how they can start their own garden projects including free and low cost programs provided by local non-profit and government agencies. Our participating families will be encouraged to openly share their experiences and growing knowledge in support of their neighbors who express interest in starting their own gardens.

As the harvest comes in they will prepare delicious meals centered around what they have grown in and share them at a dinner party where all of the families garden coaches and community members will gather.

The entire process will be documented on video and a dvd series will be created for use as a part of a community outreach campaign to promote urban gardening as a useful tool for families to improve their quality of life. The outreach campaign will consist of a series of health, gardening and community building workshops conducted in conjunction with partner organizations.