Food Up Front

Welcoming new members for 2009!

2009-04-17T06:46:00.001-07:00

After a busy few months working furiously behind the scenes, Food Up Front is now inviting members from 2008 to renew their memberships, and inviting new members to join our urban food growing network.

We now have seven working groups of volunteers who are running the network. They are 20 amazing people who were Street Reps last year, and this year they find themselves organising workshops, training new Street Reps, refreshing the membership packs, organising deliveries of starter kits, producing leaflets & newsletters, migrating email accounts, processing membership applications, the list goes on and on.. and on (...and Ariston).

So the point is, we are still here and are raring to go! If you would like to join as a member to receive a starter kit and help from a local Street Rep, as well as access to our programme of workshops, socials and trips, our online forum and our newletter etc etc, email us at fufmembers@gmail.com and tell us your postcode. Sorry but we are still only able to cover the South London areas of Wandsworth, Lambeth & Southwark.

If you would like to be a Street Rep (or would like to find out more about what it involves), write to fufstreetreps@gmail.com

There are loads of 'grow your own' initiatives & products around and about this year. We think this is fabulous and would encourage everyone to have a go at growing something edible, whether it is with the help of Food Up Front or not. We like to think that being part of a growing network can be both helpful and fun, but the main thing is, have a go!

As the Nights Draw In

2008-09-16T07:13:00.000-07:00

We have now closed membership for 2008 but are very pleased to be helping nearly 300 households to grow food this year! To try and motivate as many of our members as possible to keep growing food during the colder months we ran a very successful Autumn & Winter Growing workshop on Saturday. Nearly 50 people turned up and were able to not only learn what precautions to take when trying to grow food at this time of year, but they also went away with some very low cost and practical ways to deal with the colder temperatures, as well as lots of wonderful seeds to sow. Hopefully more and more people will realise that their pots do not have to go in to hibernation!

FUF in Action

2008-08-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

Here's a copy of an email we received from a FUF member. It's a great example of what the project is all about:

I’ve been delighted with the progress of my salad box grown from the starter kit provided when I joined. The spinach and lettuce grown in my tiny front garden have given me the yummiest lunch box in London. Spurred on by this success, I’ve also grouped together with some friends to share propagating, planting and watering duties during each others’ holidays – and I now have pumpkins, courgettes and tomatoes all growing in my front garden. The neighbours are fascinated and are getting motivated to grow food as well. The ideas given in the last newsletter about using coffee grounds to slow the slugs really worked for me, whilst I watch my neighbours battle with their slugs. I'm now collecting coffee grains to sort everyone out!

Keep Growing!

2008-08-06T09:56:00.000-07:00

Quick! Join Food Up Front now! We will only be accepting new members until the end of August, as we want to be absolutely sure that beginners get a decent chance at harvesting some of their own Summer salad leaves before the nights draw in.

However, for anyone who does join before the end of the month, and for existing members, we are going to be helping them to grow right through the year, with workshops on Winter salads and the chance to get their hands on seeds for Winter crops. We think this is really important as people tend to forget, or simply don't realise, that it is possible to grow food over the Winter months. In fact, with milder Winters like last year we were still harvesting some Summer salad in January!

Members will also be able to attend some exciting talks, workshops and social gatherings over the Autumn and Winter so don't despair if you're only just starting to think about growing some food now, and if you have been growing food already this year, don't be so quick to put down that trowel!!

Tell us how you feel (about Food Up Front)

2008-07-31T09:42:00.000-07:00

In the glorious sunshine on Sunday, twenty Food Up Front members enjoyed a special guided tour of the herbs and edible plants at the Chelsea Physic Garden, followed by a delicious lunch and good conversation in the garden restaurant. Our next big event is the Food Up Front Picnic on Sunday 31st August at the Urban Green Fair in Brockwell Park, Brixton. We are looking forward to holding the first ever Food Up Front Fabulous Vegetable Competition that day too, so we encourage all our members to bring along their best veggies to be judged by our expert panel!

Today we have been busy planning events for members over the next few months. Without giving too much away, we are planning a workshop on what you can grow in your FUF box over the Winter, a couple of talks by REALLY interesting people as well as lots of very local social events for members and lots more. As soon as things are confirmed, details will be published on our Project Dirt forum, and in the next edition of 'News Up Front', our newsletter.

Something else that started today is our first formal venture into the world of getting 'member feedback'. Marvellous Martha (a volunteer) has started to telephone Food Up Front members to ask things like how they are getting on with growing food and (scarily for us) whether they are happy with their membership of Food Up Front. We want to do everything that we can to ensure that members are having a good growing experience (sounds cheesy but it's true!) and are enjoying being part of our urban food growing network. Therefore getting honest feedback is really important to us. It will help us to improve. Martha is hoping to (eventually) phone each and every member. Please bear with her, there are over two hundred of you. If you are a member that hasn't been called yet and have something to tell us, please email us at info@foodupfront.org - we'd love to hear your views and suggestions.

2008-07-17T09:37:00.001-07:00

We went along for some drinks with some Street Reps and their members last night. A good time was had by all and we managed to talk about things other than veggies! The pub we went to, Balham Bowls Club, has signed up as a member recently and it was great to see that their coriander and rocket had germinated. They had their first box of seedlings under the window of the kitchen soon to be used in their pub food!

Online Forum Launch!

2008-07-16T07:25:00.000-07:00

Despite Seb's initial misgivings (he doesn't do Facebook or anything online for that matter) we have just launched our very own online forum on Project Dirt! It's early days yet but quite a few members have joined up in the first 24 hours. It should be a great way for our members and volunteers to exchange ideas/info/resources and ask questions about their food growing exploits...and Seb's even joined!

Surprising Statistics?

2008-07-09T13:44:00.000-07:00

We've just worked out that 47% of our members have either never grown food before or are starting again as a result of the scheme, leaving 53% who were already growing food at the time of joining. This is interesting to us as the scheme was started in order to encourage people to start growing food. Whilst it seems to be achieving this aim so far, it appears that food growers are interested in getting involved for the extra support and the social aspects of the scheme.

2008-07-09T13:34:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was a long but rewarding day. It started with a visit to a homeless charity in Lambeth. They have signed up each of their houses in Lambeth as a member, to get the tennants involved in growing food together. We delivered the containers, compost and packs to one of the houses where we demonstrated how to sow the seeds and gave out all the info. Both the staff and the tennants that were there seemed raring to go, with the tennants becoming excited about the possibility of using some of what they grow for the group meals that they have twice a week.
Then it was on to delivering containers and compost to our new and existing Street Reps, ready for new members to collect. This is a job that requires patience, what with the London traffic, but always ends up feeling good as more deliveries means more members and therefore more people starting to grow something for themselves. In fact, as we turned a corner we noticed one of our boxes in the front garden of a house with a large number of salad leaves poking out of it. Very satisfying!

2008-07-06T06:28:00.000-07:00

We went to an event called the Continuous Picnic yesterday. It was part of the London Festival of Architecture and part of the event was the Inverted Market: an opportunity for Londoners to bring London grown fruit and veg, lay it out on a long table, sketch round it and write where it came from, in order to produce a large installation.
The Inner London boroughs were far better represented but this might have been due to the weather and the time (10am on a Saturday morning).
Amongst the food was a lemon that someone had grown and Seb made sure Food Up Front were represented by taking along 3 potatoes that had been grown on his balcony.
We also presented an award for 'food grown on concrete', which was given to someone who had grown Shiso leaves outside her front door (really strange tasting leaves which are used in Sushi apparantly).
An event that would have benefitted from a larger crowd but hopefully it inspired those that attended.

2008-06-30T14:14:00.000-07:00

The Food For London Conference was held today at London City Hall. We went along and were really pleased to hear about all the positive initiatives that are going on in London, the UK and the rest of the world.
The majority of the discussion was focused on policy as well as community projects aimed at creating spaces for groups to grow food together.
Social housing was high on the agenda and it was agreed that there are valuable spaces on estates for food growing to take place. We think that this is an important area to develop but also believe that for urban food growing to become the 'norm' it needs to take place at home. It would then be seen as an activity that takes place as part of everyday life. If everyone in London sowed just one seed in a pot and picked and ate the food grown from that seed we believe that it would be easy to engage the population in larger schemes that moved towards greater self-sufficiency for the city. This is why it's crucial to start to look at what space we as individuals do have at home, no matter how small; it doesn't matter that we aren't self-sufficient, just that we're growing something that starts the reconnection and reskilling process.

Media Galore!

2008-06-25T14:22:00.000-07:00

It was our intention to post messages on our blog very regularly but this has yet to be the case.
The media's focus on the increase in oil/food prices has meant that we have been dealing with media interest over the last couple of weeks. NBC, ITV, BBC Radio 4 (listen again to July 24th Farming Today programme) and BBC Gardener's World have all been in contact.
Whilst we have lots to do to continue to develop the FUF scheme we think it's important to take advantage of these opportunities in order to spread our message: that anyone can have a go at growing some food!
Hopefully the surge of interest in urban food growing will inspire more people to get growing.

2008-06-12T13:18:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the all new Food Up Front blog!

We aim to keep you up-to-date with all that is going on within our South London urban food growing network. For starters, here's a brief run down of what's been happening so far:
Since we launched the first full year, in March, 2008, with a number of registration events in the South London boroughs of Wandsworth, Merton, Southwark and Lambeth, we have signed up nearly 200 households to the scheme, including 45 Street Rep volunteers.
Members have not only been given support whilst having a go at growing some food in their unused outdoor space, but they have also been able to take part in a number of social events, outings and workshops:

In April a number of social pub gatherings were held, giving members the opportunity of meeting other people in their area
Food Up Front has been given a large garden in Streatham for our members to use as a community allotment space. Members get together on a regular basis to develop the garden, and volunteer gardening days are held on a monthly basis
We had a fantastic day at the Chiswick House Kitchen Garden in May (www.kitchengarden.org.uk) and were treated really well by the volunteers who have worked to create such a great project
A workshop was held in Brixton, with members being given the opportunity to progress from salads and herbs. Everyone went away with at least one seedling in a pot and were looking forward to growing their first tomatoes/chillis etc.
Street Reps have been holding smaller events, with the members that they are supporting in their local area.

Our blog will be regularly updated with all the latest news from our network. In the meantime, please take a look at an article about us in The Independent recently.