Workshops-week in Marseille

The French group organized a workshops-week for Citygreeners in Marseille. The activities were organized in the shared Garden “Jardin du Belvédère” and in the garden of the association Cosmos Kolej. 

Between 20 and 40 young people participated each day to the workshops !

Tuesday

We started the activities on Tuesday 25 Febuary by visiting the Garden “Jardin du Belvédère” which is a shared garden in the 15^th district of Marseille. The garden animators Vincent and Ludvine explained to the group the principles of a shared garden and how this one in particular works.

The garden was founded in 2007 and is mananged in cooperation with the social center “Centre Social del Rio”. Principally, it is used by the inhabitants of the quarter La Viste to grow all different kinds of plants like fruits, vegetables and flowers. The area of the garden is divided up into different parcels. There are two kinds of parcels there is one big “communal parcel” and there are many smaller personal parcels. The personal parcels are for individual private use (Many of them are used by families.) So in these parcels the people can decide temselves what to grow, can harvest their own fruits and vegetables for their personal consummation.

The communal parcel is for everyone who is interested in gardening. Together all people who take part decide what to grow and if fruits and vegetables are grown they are for the community.

It’s primarily the garden animators who are looking out for this parcel, see that it is taken care of and motivate others to help with it.

Often this parcel is used for example for projects about environmental education in cooperation with schools or youths groups from the social center.

But it can also be used for example by people who don’t have enough time to take care of a personal parcel but still want to be part of the garden. Also people are still waiting to get their own parcel can help here in the meantime. (Unfortunately the garden is not big enough to give a personal parcel to everyone interested and so there is a waiting list for it.)

Of course everything that is grown in the garden is organic. That means no pesticides or synthetic fertilizers are used, but that all techniques that are used are environmentally friendly, for example there is a compost to reuse organic waste and produce naturally fertile soil.

After this interesting presentation of the garden we continued with a walk through the district where we discovered how nature can and have to have a place in a city.

Directly behind the garden there is a meadow that is a type of “no-mans-land”. This means that this is a natural space in the city that is let to itself and that people are not allow to use in any kind not to build houses, streets, factories, not even to grow plants. The goal is on the one hand to have green spaces that are integrated in the city and on the other hand to see what happens if nature is let nearly untouched in an urban environment. So scientist can come there to examine the soil or to make studies about which plants naturally grow there.

We ended the walk at the La Gare Franche.

It is a cultural association with a theatre where groups can come to practice their plays a house where they can stay (also the Citygreeners group will stay there during the exchange) and a big garden with animals.

There we then made “seed bombs” that the group was throwing on Friday.

By the way if you want to learn how to make Seed Bomb check out our video.

By the way if you want to learn how to make Seed Bombs, check out our video!

Wednesday

On Wednesday the group continued the activities with a treasure hunt through the city center of Marseille to discover the “green” streets.

The goal was for the group to sees how you can plant infront of your house even though you live in the citycenter, how a few plants can make a street seem more colourful and cheerful and less dirty and gray. Another aim was to give inspiration for our activities to plant in a creative and original way like with old bottles or bins etc. and to make funny pictures to share on the blog J.

Some participants also got the chance to talk to Hervé one of the most active urban gardeners in Marseiille.

Furthermore during the treasure hunt the participants also had to find the answers to questions about ecologic movements, sustainable and environmentally friendly development and about urban gardening in general and especially in Marseille.

Check out the map with the green streets we found and look at our questions and see how many you can answer.

Thursday

On Thursday we were in the 15^th district again.

You can find a lot of garbage there that is just thrown away into the nature which is sad because this kind of pollution can really destroy the environment. So we went there to collect some of the things that are still in a more or less fine condition. Because what many people don’t know is that one can take many things that could be considered as garbage and reuse them as flower pots which is exactly what we did. Examples of what we used are shoes, empty bottles ,cans, bins, an old camera … You just have to fill them with fertile soil like compost, make some wholes to make sure that the whole thing gets enough air and that the water can run off and then you can plant all kinds of things like different kinds of flowers, strawberrys,.herbes etc. That  way you can recycle in a creative  way because in the end you can use the former garbage to decorate your garden, your house, your street or even your whole neighbourhood.

Friday

The Last day of the workshop week started with a lot of rain and initially we thought that we had to stay inside again. But we were lucky because it was not long until the sun came out again and so finally we were able to continue the activities from the day before outside. We building flower pots made of timber pallets that you can cut the way you need them. We also painted and decorated them!

When the pallets have the right size the process is the same as from the day before you just have to fill them with fertile soil and then you can start planting. We also learned to separate “bigger” flowers in order to have many smaller plants because recycled flowerpots like bottles are usually not that huge. So to have plants that actually nurture it is easier to start with smaller ones.

Separating flowers is also very simple. You just have to carefully take them out of the soil and then divide the roots without cutting them through. Then afterwards you have several smaller specimens that you can plant separately in different flower pots.