Something to chew on
By Julian Broadhead
Chewing gum. By its very nature only a small thing but in many ways, our attitude to it is symbolic of some of the challenges we face at a broader, societal level.
Let me explain; chewing gum is a disposable commodity, which we consume for a few short minutes (usually until the flavour runs out) before getting rid of it at our convenience, often with no consideration for the impact on the environment and others. This is particularly obvious in cities, where our laissez faire approach can be observed on pavements and picked off the soles of our shoes. It seems apathy is widespread, despite the fact that it costs councils (funded by our taxes) three times the price of a single piece to clean it off.
As always though, there is a different way of doing things. Not reusable chewing gum just yet but instead, a way of recycling chewing gum.
The idea was developed by product designer Anna Bullus, who spent months in a laboratory finding a way to turn used gum into a usable plastic, called BRGP (Bullus Recycled Gum Polymer). The result to date has been the creation of the Gumdrop Bin Project, which offers distinctive pink bins (made from BRGP, naturally) for your flavourless deposit, with the whole thing then being processed to create more BRGP for more bins, in an ever growing cycle. Even better though, there’s no reason why BRGP cannot be used more widely in a range of roles currently filled by normal, oil based plastics.
Not only does the Gumdrop Bin Project offer the environmental benefits of turning waste into a new material, it is also an opportunity for city dwellers to make a positive, more considerate choice about their own surroundings. That can only be a good thing and although the initiative is still in its infancy, we are hoping to see more of the bright pink bins in the near future.
Free for all
By Shane Solanki, picture Briony Campbell
Did you know that 25% of our food is wasted? Perfectly good grub is either left to rot, or thrown away, discarded either by home dwellers or by retailers. Look out for the trend in supermarkets putting locks on bins to prevent food being scavenged by foxes, dumpster divers or freegans (see Street food previously on VivaCity).
But where there is waste, there is want. Take The People’s Kitchen, an initiative run by chef Steve Wilson at the Passing Clouds venue in Dalston, Hackney. Inspired by Berlin’s People’s Kitchen, the initiative seeks to tackle the problem of food waste.
Every Sunday at Passing Clouds, a freegan kitchen run by volunteers offers healthy food for donations only. Freeganism is a lifestyle whereby people employ alternative living strategies based on limited participation in the conventional economy and minimal consumption of resources. Freegans “embrace community, generosity, social concern, freedom, cooperation, and sharing in opposition to a society based on materialism, moral apathy, competition, conformity, and greed.” Donations come from volunteers, local organic food shops and homeless food charities.
Steve’s sister Eleanor Wilson, who runs Passing Clouds, explained to me that the ethos of the People’s Kitchen includes offering a day package to her local community; collecting food, cooking and eating together, learning about nutrition, having the opportunity to watch films and documentaries on prescient social issues, and to participate in an open mic jam session featuring musicians from around the world.
Eleanor is producing a ‘how to’ guide, which she intends to distribute as an open source document, initially to churches, village halls and community centres. By-products of such an initiative would include community engagement, and education about both nutrition and the environment. Imagine feeding the entire population of London, the UK, or the world – for free!
Bounty castle
By Chris Speirs (photo Vanessa)
It’s 6pm, and I’m getting ready for my weekly cycle home from London’s Kings Cross. Black cloud and horizontal rain streak across the glassed building opposite, reminding me to once again stow my paddle and goggles. Then I remember… it’s Thursday! I leap from my seat. I have bounty awaiting me at the castle.
The castle is a magnificent Victorian water pumping station in Hackney, now home to a climbing centre, and the bounty is our weekly organic veg box that Growing Communities, earlier that day, have hidden away in the ramparts of the castle.
Growing Communities established the first box scheme in London, with the “aim of creating a more sustainable, re-localised food system - changing what we eat, how we eat and how it’s farmed.” The scheme harnesses the local communities’ collective buying power to source food locally, and support small farmers. And has accomplished something truly special with it’s ‘urban market gardens’. These community-focused gardens are springing up all over Hackney, including the grounds of the castle itself. They offer volunteers training, apprenticeships and employment in organic gardening, and supply the very salad that members collect and feast on throughout the growing season.
This week I arrive at the foot of the castle looking like I have completed a lap of the moat. I peel off my goggles and enter the secret code to the door. As it swings open I snag my bag of veg, cross our order off the list and sneak a quick peak. I find some familiar friends, and some acquaintances I have yet to meet. With the organic bounty safely slung across my pannier rack, I slip back onto Green Lanes and paddle home.
The bag comes complete with news from the scheme, veg identification and recipes. This week my new edible friends are crown prince pumpkin and jerusalem artichokes. The latter of which, they explain, is a relative of the sunflower. It can be eaten raw, roasted or fried, and tastes deliciously like water chestnuts.
All under one roof
By Julian Broadhead
Feeding the population of a major city is no mean feat, requiring production and logistical organisation on an industrial scale, and thereby extending the influence of urban centres far beyond their physical boundaries.
Judging by the number of times it crops up as a theme here on VivaCity though, this is clearly a situation that makes many people uneasy, prompting questions about where our food comes from, how it is produced and our relationship to it. For those concerned with such matters, the immediate solution appears to be bringing food cultivation into the urban environment and taking personal control, ranging from keeping chickens in your back garden to planting orchards in train stations.
The latest and slightly different addition to this list of food activists is particularly exciting. FARM:shop is an initiative founded by the ‘eco-social design practice’, Something and Son.
Based in a formerly disused shop in Dalston, London, it is a farm, shop, cafe, exhibition and meeting space all rolled into one. More than all this though, FARM:shop is an experiment in urban food production, with the expressed aim of combining the best of traditional and modern techniques to grow as much food as possible in this limited space. In practice, this means chickens on the roof and poly-tunnels for vegetables in the garden, whilst indoors there is hydroponic growing, aquaponic fish farming and mushroom cultivation.
So, could FARM:shop represent the shape of things to come? Its founders certainly think so, as this project is merely the beginning of a larger FARM:London initiative, designed to encourage the production of food (and other materials) in the greater London area, both recreationally and commercially. For us at VivaCity, it is this ambition that makes FARM:shop so exciting and inspiring, and no doubt we will not be alone in following its progress in the coming months with some interest.
Easy as pie
By Dagmar Hoogland
Pies and Alabama; it’s a winning mix. This is what a group of young graphic designers thought when they opened a pie shop in the middle of Greensboro, an underprivileged part of the US where about one-third of the children live in poverty. Their mission was to give a positive impulse to the community and the problems within by…sharing pie.
In 2002, The Birmingham News called the Black Belt “Alabama’s Third World.” How could the baking and serving of pie help tackle entrenched social and economic ills?
Project M aimed to answer just such questions. Part of what has become known as the “design for good” movement, Project M was established by a designer named John Bielenberg. Based in Belfast, Maine, it functions as a kind of idea incubator, where young designers are invited to two-week programs to generate solutions to social problems and enhance public life.
They started with the one thing that has been bringing people together for as long as mankind exists: food. Their first project was Free Pie Day, On May 1 of this year, during which Project M members stood on a Belfast street corner and handed out slices of pecan pie, pumpkin pie and apple pie to passers-by. The idea was to spur community and conversation, one slice at a time. Free Pie Day turned out to be an example and similar efforts took place in Washington, Brooklyn and elsewhere. Most important, it inspired PieLab.
“PieLab provides a neutral environment in a traditionally segregated town where people from every race and class are welcome to sit together and talk candidly about whatever is on their mind.”
It’s a low budget affair. Made from reclaimed building materials and thrift store finds, PieLab cost near to nothing to produce, yet already has a devoted following sometimes with 25 or more customers a day. “We already have some regulars,” says Jones. “People will stay for hours to sit and talk with us, giving Project M invaluable insight into the community’s needs, personalities and politics.”
It is these insights that became the start of change and provided new opportunities. Scott Hamilton, a local resident who comes in almost every day to draw, is the living proof. He has never taken an art class, but has an incredible talent for drawing. He told the PieLab crew that he dreams of going to art school and one day making movies, so they photographed his work and built a Web site to help him apply for scholarships and college. Perhaps he will become the new Hirst or Coppola; gaining worldwide recognition, inspiring generations of art students or instigating a new global movement in art. And it all started with a piece of pie.
Feast of strangers
by Shane Solanki
The 21st century is deemed to be the age of communication, and yet people seem to be becoming more and more isolated.
Why? Professor Theodore Zeldin has an answer. “There is less and less time, and a great hunger for conversations that are not superficial,” he tells us. That’s why every year, Zeldin (born in Palestine in 1933, educated in Egypt and Oxford, French government advisor and author of ‘An Intimate History Of Humanity’) has a birthday party with a difference. For starters, he likes to invite as many strangers as he can to the party. He sits them down, partners them up, and offers them a menu of conversation. The menu lists topics and questions through which feasters can discover who sits opposite them, prompting conversation which explores intimacy, love, fear, sensuality, tolerance and many more delicious morsels which make up the meal we all are. Within minutes, shyness dissipates, curiosity is engaged, and you might find yourself telling a stranger what you really really want, what you’re afraid of, and who you’d like to be.
The Feast of Strangers is coming to a town near you soon. Look out for feasts in Europe, South America and Asia over the next year; we’ve heard of feasts being organised in Bangalore in December, and Sao Paolo in April. You could even organise one yourself, and if you contact us directly, we’ll put you in touch with Theodore. If all of us start talking to each other, regardless of age, occupation and belief, who knows what conversations, relationships and communities we can build over the coming generation.
Dancing in the streets too
By Shane Solanki. Picture Briony Campbell
The folk at VivaCity love a party, and who can blame us? We recently covered Streets Alive and the party held in a structure made from umbrellas, the Bucky Bar. This time we celebrate The Big Lunch a UK-wide campaign to get as many people having street parties on a single day as possible, with the intention of getting neighbours to hang out with each other and rediscover a sense of community spirit.
This year, we got together with our neighbours, and had a party. We hand-delivered flyers to each of the two hundred homes on our council estate, introducing ourselves and explaining the ethos behind the Big Lunch.
We constructed a children’s den and made home-made bunting, from African fabrics at our local market. We had a bike surgery, a juice bar, a parkour workshop, and a competition for the best dish (we’d asked all of neighbours to bring dishes representing their heritage). There was Nigerian jolof rice, Bengali pakora and Brazilian pão de queijo to eat.
A local musician and busker kept us entertained for hours with his double bass, getting us all to sing along to classic tunes in the sunshine. The children (of all ages and stages of hair loss) played inside the magical den. A girl who cartwheeled perfectly invoked an impromptu forward roll competition. Lots of kids helped us dig and water a patch of communal ground, in which we planted herbs, which we intend to keep expanding as a community herb garden.
We cooked, eat, drank, laughed and played until the sun went down.
The Big Lunch is a remarkable initiative, which works. None of us want to grow up alone, separate from our neighbours, and afraid of the places we live in - and none of us have to. By breaking bread with our neighbours, by sharing our stories, our food, our cultures and our lives, we can build a sense of community; a sense of pride in our local neighbourhood; a sense of belonging.
Now, we’re all starting to smile at each other and call each other by our names. We’re knocking on doors, sharing news, cups of tea, cans of beer, and even risottos, curries and pies. We’re sitting out on our front porches and greeting the people who walk by, as their attention is caught by the sunflowers which line our front gardens (which our neighbours didn’t ask permission to plant, and yet which the council now smile at too). Even the guy in the CCTV van which sits outside our estate has started to say hello.
Life for all of us is changing. Neighbours who used to say, “it’s not what it used to be round here,” are now saying, “it’s like the old days, when we all knew each other!” Newer neighbours, who have just moved in, are starting to get comfortable and get stuck into the process of building community, not being afraid to bring their diverse cultures and experiences to the table.
Life can be sweet. All it needs is each of us to take the initiative. The Big Lunch will be even bigger in 2011, so find out how you can start making the place you live into a brighter, warmer, more beautiful community. If you live outside the UK, why not start your own initiative using The Big Lunch formula. It’s fun to break bread with your neighbours, and it might just make this world a nicer place to live in.
VivaCity birthday honours list - part 2
By Julian Broadhead, Dagmar Hoogland, Andy Marks and Shane Solanki
Welcome to the second instalment of the VivaCity birthday honours list, where we select our favourite movements which are changing the way we see and use cities for the better. Feel free to surf, bowl, bomb, flash, plant, eat, discuss, inspire and honour in your neighbourhood…
Ghost Bikes
Showing the difficulties of a rising bike culture in a car driven world, this initiative is daring and controversial, as its not always appreciated to point out the painful reality. Deserves credit as it takes a difficult subject head on, in a beautiful haunting way. Dagmar
Couch Surfing
Your sofa isn’t just a place to plonk your butt and zone out to an episode of Lost / Madmen / The Wire / Desperate Housewives (delete as appropriate). It is a place for folk from around the world to seek shelter, be entertained, entertain, share food and life stories. Andy
TED
The worlds most exciting platform for discussion and new ideas that’s bringing free knowledge and inspiration to the global community. From some of the world’s most inspired thinkers - believing that the power of ideas are the start of any change, TED’s the place to be. Dagmar
Seed Bombs
One of the most ubiquitous instruments of conflict, reinvented as a means by which to enhance and bring a little bit of nature back to those neglected areas of the urban landscape. Julian
Flash Mobs
The flash mob is not that new but this spontaneous action shows the collective fun of a crowd, it shows guts, action, and surprise turning to delight. Our example starting on the beach by an enthusiastic boy in red speedo’s embodies the VivaCity spirit. Dagmar
Urban vegetable gardens
Transforming the way we relate to energy, consumption, food and public space, planting stuff (be it vegetables, fruit or flowers) in the city is the most blatant example of how grassroots movements are spearheading the changes that will affect all of us city dwellers through this century. Shane
Speakeasies
Underground dining or Speakeasies - no rules, no sky high bills and no time slots, this is a private affair for foodies who love to meet people and welcome each other into their most private part of life: their home. It reflects a playful and social attitude towards food and food sharing. Dagmar
Midnight Cricket
This most formal of games played spontaneously under the yellow glow of street lights. What’s not to love? Julian
VivaCity birthday honours list - part 1
By Julian Broadhead, Dagmar Hoogland, Andy Marks and Shane Solanki
A year older and hopefully a year street, junction, underpass and ring road wiser. Looking back over the last year, we have selected our favourite grassroots movements which are changing the way we see and use cities for the better.
Afro Reggae
Trading guns, drugs and brutal violence in Rio’s favelas for an electrifying mix of rhythms, dance, theatre and martial arts; a spellbinding platform for young people to get their lives back on track. See them at London’s Southbank this weekend. Andy
Yarn bombing
Hilariously named knitting ‘crews’; a form of civil disobedience few could fail to appreciate and a fantastic way to bring a little bit of colour and creativity to our public spaces. Julian
The art of street art
Colombia recently almost elected a president who, as mayor of Bogota, successfully replaced the corrupt traffic police with a team of mime artists. Urban street art encourages us to be playful with the world that we live in, claiming it back from advertising hoardings and the long arm of the law. Shane
Hidden Park
Turning a screen obsessed culture on it’s head – off the sofa and in to the park with your smart phone to find magical creatures and beasties lurking, roaming and entrancing. Andy
Random huggers
The smallest of things can brighten your day and change your outlook. A hug, even from a stranger, could be just that thing. Julian
Holes in walls
Sugata Mitra’s famous experiment, where he put a computer into a hole in the wall in a slum in Delhi, was remarkable for demonstrating that if you give people the means, they’ll learn, create and improvise. If you haven’t quite curbed your urge to fly to hot places, then on your next trip, take the bus out to a slum, make some friends, give them your old laptop (you know, the one that’s been sitting under your desk unused for the last two years), and watch what happens! Shane
Growing fruit trees at train stations
Concrete, charmless, chilly, colourless train stations. Planting, tending and harvesting apples, redcurrants, blackcurrants and blackberries means I for one will never look at a train station the same way ever again. Andy
Bags of hope
Recycling, dealing with ever increasing mountains of plastic in a constructive way, providing employment and income for people below the poverty line, making something beautiful - Conserve India makes fashion items out of rubbish collected on the streets of Delhi. The perfect VivaCity movement. Shane
The tree on platform one is…
By Andy Marks
Growing food in the city. A good idea which ever way you look at it. Guaranteed fresh food. Cutting food miles and packaging. Showing off to your friends and family, even recruiting them to muck in with planting.
But many a city dweller may ask, where can we grow? With space at such a premium and high-rise living often the norm. Well, inspiration can be found in the most unlikely of places.
Take Londoner Laura Laker. A frequent commuter, drudging through railway stations in and around the city. Grey platforms, grey walls, grey skies, and forlorn planters sparked a rather beautiful idea. Emboldened by her friends at Transition Towns, Laura approached the management at her local railway station, Haringey Green Lanes, and suggested a planting and growing scheme on land at the station.
Now you might think the powers that be in areas such as public transport and land management would be both un-enthused and slow to respond, but in fact they welcomed the idea, and got all excited about community projects. Hurrah!
With help from local residents, other Transitioners, and our friends at conservation charity BTCV, Laura realised her ambition to show passers-by that it is possible to grow food even in unlikely places. Given the conditions, it was decided that fruit trees would be a good choice, specifically three apple trees, three redcurrant bushes, blackcurrants and blackberries. Station staff even volunteered to water them.
If further inspiration were necessary, get a copy of The Carbon Army’s Grow Your Own Food guide from BTCV, which is full of handy tips and delicious recipes. Do share your cultivation successes with fellow VivaCity types below…
