School Project Is Blooming Success - 24 July 2000
The front garden at Maple Infants School in Surbiton has recently been given a touch of the ‘ground force’ treatment - but with a difference. The new garden has been designed and built around plants re-used from the Yellow Pages/Marie Curie ‘Sun Awareness’ Garden, which won an RHS Silver Medal at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show.
In true makeover fashion, the Kings Landscape family team pulled out all the stops and completed the garden in one day - in the rain! The garden is the latest stage in a £6,000 project supported by Yellow Pages Group to redevelop the school’s playground and outdoor areas.
The idea of re-using plants from Chelsea fits in perfectly with the environmental objectives of the project, where planters made from recycled plastic have been blooming in the nursery area for months.
The school’s brand new sandpit was also unveiled today and did its bit for the environment - the paving around the sandpit has been re-used from an area of the school currently under development.
Saplings from the Chelsea garden will be used to create a small copse in the autumn and now that the school has taken delivery of eye-catching plant labels from Yellow Pages Group, work can commence on the nature trail. Soon some of the trees on the trail will offer an added attraction. The remaining funds will be spent on tree seats - made out of recycled materials, of course.
"We’ve been very lucky," said Jean Cutts, head teacher. "To think the project evolved almost by happy accident when the environmental champions from Yellow Pages asked us if we could utilise their scrap paper!
"Because of our other building work, it’s taken us a while to complete the project, but overall it has been a huge success and we are extremely grateful to Yellow Pages for all their support."
Martin Williams, London regional sales manager, Yellow Pages Group, added: "I want to thank Marnie Blackmore and Claire Harvey from my team for suggesting this project to us. It’s wonderful to know that we’ve made a big difference to a school we are neighbours with."
