Welcome to our post that looks at Community Gardens in Berlin.
According to Marin Master Gardeners:
“A community garden is any piece of land gardened by a group of people, utilizing either individual or shared plots on public or private land”.
Did you know that Berlin offers a wide range of community gardens and agriculture projects all around the city?
Top 3 Community Gardens in Berlin
This movement was possible after the second world war, as the city was not able to fund infrastructure and land fell vacant.
This opened up the possibility for people with apartment gardens to move to open gardens designed especially for the citizens to harvest.
Community gardens provide organic products as well as contributing to education, connection with the environment and neighbourhood upgrading.
Prinzessinnen Garten
In Berlin, Prinzessinnengarten is a community garden located in Kreuzberg in a site which had been a wasteland for over half a century.
This space promotes a sense of community and the exchange of a wide variety of competencies and forms of knowledge.
This particular green space is open for the public to explore, communicate, learn about biological diversity as well as food production and locally produced fresh vegetables.
Prinzessinnengarten is extensively frequented by visitors of the public as well as volunteers.
The land is rented from the state of Berlin. The core activities are vegetable production in mobile boxes, and a functioning café.
The garden hosts a range of cultural activities such as music concerts, and art exhibitions as well as workshops dealing with the question of local subsistence, urban development, and social integration.
On Saturdays, you can go there and have a nice afternoon working in the garden as a volunteer. Learn more at www.prinzessinnengarten.net
Tempelhof Airport
After many years of being inactive, Tempelhof Airport has been the subject of controversy. Numerous ideas, and urban and housing projects were proposed to change the face of the abandoned airport.
Lots of doubts were raised by the citizens after rumors of gentrification, so it was decided in a referendum that the space should remain intact for the people.
Today, this enormous green space offers a variety of social projects, and the possibility to relax and have a good time between friends and family.
Actually, the main building of the airport hosts around 1500 refugees temporarily using the facilities.
In this context, Allmende-Kontor is an urban public space where interested individuals and groups can join a vast community of gardeners.
This initiative allows people to connect and learn about nutrition, health, and ecology. It also promotes diversity, integration, sense of community and participative urban design.
The goal of Allmende-Kontor is to network the movement at all levels with administrative and political authorities and provide advice to activists from the community garden scene who are interested in developing their own initiative.
Different workshops take place in this community garden so if you are interested check the website for more information: www.allmende-kontor.de
>Climatic Garden Maxim – Urban Youth Educational Project
Maxim Climate-Garden is a project created for educational purposes as well as for recreational activities for the children, the youth and interested neighbours.
It has been developed in cooperation with a research team that concentrates on climate change adaptation in Berlin and Brandenburg. This garden is a very good example to learn about food production and urban gardening in a hands-on project.
Young people have the chance to taste and cook their own cultivated products. Everyone can experiment in this open garden with organic fruits, vegetables, and herbs.
Young people have a chance to learn about climate change and adaptation strategies.
Also, Maxim offers recreational opportunities and courses such as painting, drawing, pottery, and crafts.
Maxim is a community project managed with great commitment and an amazing vibe if you are interested in doing an internship or having a nice day in a beautiful garden visit: www.im-maxim.de/
Community Gardens in Berlin: Conclusion
Despite its past, Berlin is safe to visit and these initiatives support a more inclusive form of environmental learning in cities.
In the way of pursuing more sustainable cities for the future, community gardens play an important role in the everyday practices and experiences of its citizens.
The city of Berlin, known for its big percentage of green spaces, offers a wide variety of community gardens which help to reconnect people with the environment.
Such environmental learning is very important as a dominant portion of the population is living in cities and consuming natural resources, so Berlin is a very good example of how to improve and integrate open green spaces and cities as a unique system.
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