Join us for our annual celebration in the Orchard Garden at TOSH! Gather with our global community to enjoy arts activity, creative writing, and a special live performance from our weekly music group with Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.

• Discover the Orchard Garden - meet fellow community members who helped to bring the project to life, and chat with our amazing garden volunteer team who care for the space!
• Explore drop-in creative activities - join local artist Mahtab Grimshaw for a textiles workshop, and Neil Benad from The Outsiders Project for a creative writing taster.
• Enjoy a community music performance of original compositions and playful covers from B.A.N.G. (Boscombe Awesome Noise Group), our weekly community music group with Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.
• Experience pieces of writing from members from The Outsiders Project.
• See and explore Home, a wall-hanging piece produced by the international women of Seeking Refuge Project's Threads group. Learn about this collaborative textiles project, and chat with some of the women involved!

Come together and enjoy cool drinks, tea, and cakes with our community.

ALL FREE, ALL WELCOME

About The Orchard Garden‍

The Orchard Garden was created and developed by our community of garden volunteers. Now serving as a community space, the garden project has provided nature craft workshops, volunteering opportunities, and our garden skills programme.

The Orchard Garden was first built during the 2015 refurbishment of TOSH. For years the garden contained just four fruit trees, with spring bulbs and wildflowers growing up each Summer. After received two years of funding in January 2023, we consulted with our community to commission a new garden design. Our theme was ‘Food for Us, Food for Nature’, designed to be a sanctuary for our community to rest, learn, grow and harvest in.

The Orchard Garden, developed over 2023 and 2024, was largely built by our volunteer community, made up of local residents, refugees, and asylum seekers. The space is now maintained by our amazing team of garden volunteers.

Building The Orchard Garden

The garden was built with nature and community at heart. Recycled materials were used to build our pathways and seating, and our garden bench was made from recycled plastic. Members of our community groups at TOSH created terracotta tiles to be embedded into the seating circle, and the international women of Seeking Refuge Project’s ‘Threads’ group sewed cushion covers and bunting. Local charity Faithworks and their workshop team created our arbour seat.

Since undergoing the garden build, 14 new fruit trees have been planted, as well as climbers, wild flowers and bulbs.

About our annual Community Garden Celebration

The Orchard Garden officially opened in July 2024. To commemorate this milestone, we were joined by over 100 people at our Open Day event to celebrate the hard work of our volunteers, sharing global foods and enjoying nature themed crafts. Now an annual celebration, the garden offers an opportunity for our diverse communities to come together, celebrating this inclusive space and all that it represents.

Our community now use our garden daily - running workshops or movement sessions outdoors in the sunshine, or enjoying the space for lunch breaks, making, and quiet time. Our neighbours come to run, play, forage and explore nature.

This project has been made possible with funding from the People’s Health Trust using money raised by Health Lottery South West. We have also received donations from JPMorgan, Wessex Water and more.

‍