National Trust and partners signal hope and healing with blossoming ambitions around the UK
- Conservation charity and partners choose spring blossom as a symbol of reflection and hope, with plan to plant blossoming tree circles in towns and cities across England, Wales and Northern Ireland over next five years
- Tree circles and individual blossom tree planting reflect ambitions for more people to have access to nature where they live, and spaces for reflection, following the coronavirus pandemic
- Project will tap into cultural links to spring blossom, and the Trust’s drive to create a British equivalent of Japan’s ‘Hanami’ – the popular custom of enjoying the transient beauty of flowers
- Secretary of State supports Trust’s ambitions to ‘open up new green spaces across the country’
- MPs to be offered a blossoming tree for planting in their constituency in England, Wales and Northern Ireland
- First project to get started is the London Blossom Garden, created in partnership with the Mayor of London for the capital, to commemorate people lost to Covid-19 and to pay tribute to Londoners, in same borough as NHS Nightingale Hospital
- More spaces in the pipeline for Newcastle, Nottingham and Plymouth and other locations expected to be announced soon
- Trees will be among those planted to meet the Trust’s ambition to plant 20 million trees by 2030 to help tackle climate change and create new homes for nature
- Players of People’s Postcode Lottery will help fund blossoming circles
A year on from the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, the National Trust and partners are looking to spring blossom to help signal reflection and hope with their plans to plant blossoming tree circles in cities across England, Wales and Northern Ireland over the next five years.
Part of the charity’s blossom campaign which kicks off in earnest next month, the ambition is to create beautiful green spaces in and near urban areas to connect more people to nature and to create spaces for hope and reflection as the UK looks forward.
Last summer, a report by Vivid Economics highlighted inequalities in access to green space across Britain with 295 deprived urban neighbourhoods described as ‘grey deserts’, with no trees or accessible green space.
And last spring, many recognised the importance of access to nature during lockdown when so many found time in nature beneficial not just for their physical health but mental wellbeing too.
Previous research by the Trust has found that everyday connection to nature is beneficial to human health and wellbeing and also benefits the natural environment as those who are more connected to nature are more likely to take action to protect and care for it.
Thousands shared striking images of spring blossom to help lift people’s spirits with the charity’s first ever #BlossomWatch campaign as England went into its first lockdown last March.
The Trust now hopes to embed an annual marking of Spring blossom season, emulating Japan’s hanami, which brings all generations outdoors, boosting tourism and helping people connect with nature.
Local residents will be able to use the new blossom spaces as quiet places for reflection, peace and enjoyment. The conservation charity will work with partners and local communities on the design, tree planting and plans for how the spaces will be used now and in the future. The spaces can be used in various ways including for events and social gatherings, workshops, festivals and exhibitions as lockdown restrictions are eased and for years to come.
The annually blossoming tree circles, with support in part from players of People’s Postcode Lottery, will be planted both on and off the Trust’s land, with the charity working with partners to ensure sites are accessible and meet the needs of local communities.
Partners include Historic England who have also pledged to support the project as part of its High Streets Heritage Action Zone programme.
The Trust also aims to offer Members of Parliament a blossoming tree for planting in their constituency.
Hilary McGrady, Director General at the National Trust says: “Our vision is for nature, beauty and history for everyone. Our simple ambition with this project is to bring all of these elements together in the creation of green, nature-rich havens in the very heart of urban areas which are also beautiful and inspiring spaces that people can use.
Our founder Octavia Hill recognised how everyone needs beautiful, open spaces, wherever they live.
As we create more and more spaces we also want to embed annual blossom moments or celebrations in the nations’ cultural calendar.”
She continued: “Everyone needs nature and beauty. We know how important it is for people to connect with nature in their everyday lives. These spaces will enable communities to do just that. It benefits people and the environment[6]. With 83 per cent of people living in urban areas in England[7], and many communities deprived of nature, we are going back to our founders’ roots with an ambition to bring nature to where it’s needed most.
This project is just one element of our ambitions to plant more trees and to address Britain’s need for green space and nature where people live; but it has an important part to play. If, by creating these blossom spaces, we can create areas for people of all ages to take notice and connect with the natural world – while also creating havens for urban nature – that has to be a good thing.”
Oliver Dowden, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said: “I know from my time in Japan during the sakura season how beautiful cherry blossom can be. So I very much support this National Trust initiative to open up new green spaces across the country and bring more of this wonderful spectacle to the UK.
It’s a fantastic example of how heritage organisations help make our neighbourhoods more beautiful and improve our physical and mental well-being, and I look forward to seeing this project bloom in our communities.“
The site for the first blossom circle will be Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Newham, the same borough as the temporary NHS Nightingale hospital in London. The London Blossom Garden is being created in partnership with the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, with support from Bloomberg, working with Rosetta Arts and landscape architects The Edible Bus Stop and Davies White Landscape Architects.
Local residents were invited to help shape the tone, feel and use of their circle. The space will be a commemorative space to reflect on the impact of Covid-19 on the capital, and a place to remember all those who have lost their lives, honour key workers and reflect on the city’s shared experience of the pandemic.
The final agreed design includes 33 UK grown trees including cherry, plum, hawthorn and crab apple to represent the 33 London boroughs. These will be arranged in three circles and become part of a new public garden. Planting is currently underway with the new garden due to be completed this spring.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: “This new public garden will create a lasting, living memorial to commemorate all those who have lost their lives in the pandemic. It will be a tribute to the amazing ongoing work of our key workers and create a space for Londoners to contemplate and reflect on all this global pandemic has meant to our city and world. The blossoming trees will be a permanent reminder of this incredibly challenging time in all our lives and a symbol of how Londoners have stood together to help one another.”
Another three blossom inspired spaces are also in the pipeline for Newcastle, Nottingham and Plymouth. Although plans are in their infancy, working in partnership with Urban Green Newcastle and Newcastle City Council and the respective City Councils in Nottingham and Plymouth, the Trust’s ambition is to create areas which will reflect the unique character of these cities and their communities.
Blossom Programme Manager, Annie Reilly added: “We will be working hard to ensure each space is designed to deliver something special in line with the individual needs of the local community. They might be large or small, intimate spaces; they will only become more beautiful over time as the trees root themselves in their surroundings, and we hope, into people’s daily lives.
We hope to inspire and work closely with neighbours to leave a lasting legacy – to develop a activities and events with strong seasonal links which will chime with their needs and have the broadest possible appeal. Ideas could include marking the start of spring by taking inspiration from the start of the blossom season – but also picnics, plays, readings and music events in the summer and autumn candlelit gatherings.”
The spaces will be supported in part by players of People’s Postcode Lottery and the charity will also be actively fundraising to plant more tree circles. For more information or to make a donation, visit www.nationaltrust.org.uk/blossom-watch
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Sounds like a niece idea but of course raises a lot of questions. E.G. where is the land coming from? Who will pay for this? The National Trust currently have a large reduction in income. Presumably most of the trees will be non-native garden hybrids? Why not use native trees? Why not use trees that are good for insects especially bees? We don’t want unsuitable trees planted on unsuitable areas such as on good places for wildlife.
There are many questions to be addressed if this initiative is to be successful. One wonders if things have really been properly thought through, or whether it is more a flag waving exercise?
The press release mentions funding from the People’s Post Code Lottery. It also states that the London garden with which they are kicking off the project will involve the planting of “UK grown trees”. The species mentioned were cherry, plum, hawthorn and crab apple which should all be perfectly acceptable to bees and other pollinators. They are also foodplants for a variety of moth species and produce fruits which are eaten by various bird species. On the face of this press release it is hard to judge how well it has all been thought through but we are certainly not in a position to say that it hasn’t been.
It will of course be important to ensure that these gardens are not superimposed onto existing sites of importance for nature but that does not seem to be an impossible hurdle to clear. Time will tell if this is a flag waving exercise or something more but at this stage it seems to me to be something to be welcomed.
“National Trust and partners signal hope and healing with blossoming ambitions around England Wales and Northern Ireland” There, that’s better.
I wonder if the National Trust for Scotland decided not to get involved. Perhaps they thought there was less need for hope and healing.
I’ve lived in Scotland for 40 years and until recently never really noticed this hegemonic sort of stuff, let alone bothered by it. Why am I now so irritated by it.
Anyway, nice idea. Good luck.
The natural capital Committee in its headline recommendations said there is a strong economic case for 250,000 hectares of new community woodland around our towns and cities. A recommendation that has been almost totally ignored – it seems blossom glades are more the scale at which we are capable of thinking at the moment, despite all the brave words about large scale transformation.
Imagine for a moment what that green space would have meant for millions and millions of trapped people over the past year.
As for land, land is rationed by central Government (though they like to try and claim not) through planning. Why not simply say that every hectare of greenfield for housing has to bring 5-10 hectares right there, not off somewhere away from people, with it for green space. All it would do was reduce the bonanza of planning from a lottery win scale of £1 million per hectare to a super-uplift of £100,000 / hectare.
As well as commemorating those who died in the pandemic, can the gardens also commemorate all the marine animals we have choked with plastic, all the orangutans killed or made homeless by our insatiable greed, and all the other less photogenic animals & plants destroyed similarly?
How typical that it should focus on our suffering.
And then, they become the next generation’s ‘save our trees from destruction by the council’ campaign……..
OK, I’ll get my coat!
“Though on the sign it is written:
‘Don’t pick these blossoms’ –
it is useless against the wind,
which cannot read”
This has nothing to do with ‘access to nature’, it’s just cultural gardening of which we already have plenty in our public parks. I’m glad I’m not wasting money on a NT membership. I somehow doubt they will be planting blackthorn or hawthorn thickets.
Hi Sandra,
I am a gardener with the National Trust, regardless of the blossom campaign, I am in the middle of replacing several hundred metres of hawthorn and blackthorn hedging. Also involved with small rewinding projects, meadow creation, planting a new mixed orchard with many traditional apple varieties, and working on a crab apple collection. I am one of hundreds of National Trust gardeners and rangers (other staff and volunteers) working hard at developing habitat for nature, engaging people with nature and committed to providing access. Your doubt is misplaced.
Yes, ‘Crab Apple’, gardening for nature has its place, I do it myself but the project described is not, in my book, the way to offer ‘access to nature’. People, and particularly children, need wild, unmanicured spaces to roam in and the project described is tame and frankly boring.
Crikey! There’s a lot of negativity about this. Apparently they probably haven’t thought it through properly…they will probably plant non-native species…there will probably be a pointless sign saying ‘do not pick the flowers’…they are not doing it to commemorate whales or orang utans…the gardens will probably in some distant future be threatened with development…clearly it’s not worth bothering with!
Secretary of State supports Trust’s ambitions to ‘open up new green spaces across the country’
So the SecState will be bringing new Right to Roam legislation in England then? No, thoughtnot.
Greenwashing all the way.