FRIENDS OF THE STOREY GARDENS
Newsletter
Issue No 2
March 2013
Constitutionally OK
At the recent meeting of The Friends group on 26 March we agreed the Constitution
(with one or two slight amendments), which is of course an historic moment. All on the
mailing list should receive a copy of the agreed version – and once our website is up
and running, it will be available there. It is an agreeably short and simple document,
which will no doubt be the subject of many amendments in the future, just like the
American Constitution, but so far contains no inalienable rights, so controversy we hope
will not blemish it.
Sub-Groups
Small sub-groups have now been set up to deal with various issues raised at the last
meeting –
 Health & Safety – we have tackled some of the H&S points needed to make sure
that all the people who want to work and help out with The Gardens are kept safe
and sound, but as you are probably all aware, H&S is a complex area (rather like
a minefield). A sub-group consisting of Stephen, Paula and Ian will be looking
into what we need to do to be fully up to speed. Anyone else with knowledge of
and/or an interest in this area who would like to join in, please make yourselves
known to Annie
 Open Day planning – a group consisting of Annie, Francesca, Jenny, Catherine,
Paula and Sue are getting together to make sure that the Open Day, planned for
18 May (see below), really starts to promote our group, attracts more members
and raises some money. We will be in touch further to ask for help and
donations.
Good News on the Funding Front
Even before we were formally constituted, Annie, our Chair, had put in a bid for tools,
plants etc to the County Council Green Partnership Award Scheme, and has just heard
that we have been awarded £500 – great stuff. Let’s hope that the same good fortune
(or skill in putting together fundraising bids) attends our next venture – a bid to the local
Galbraith Trust, which the meeting agreed could be put towards a Bulb Planting Project
in September to involve local primary school pupils and members of community groups
– representatives from Lancaster District Homeless Action Service have expressed an
interest in service users working with us on future projects. There will no doubt be other
community groups who would like to take part. It would be wonderful if we could plant 1
million bulbs (or thereabouts). What a transformation that would be.
March 2013 – could look like this in March 2014
March in The Gardens – First Work Session
About 20 people turned up on Sunday 3 March for the first Group work session in The
Storey Gardens. Although a grey afternoon it was brightish and dry – so not a bad day
for our first go. It might have tested commitment if it had been pouring down.
There was diversity both in the age range of the gardeners (pretty young to quite a bit
older) and in the tools provided for cutting, digging, chopping, hammering and
transporting, and plenty to keep us all busy. During the time from 2.00pm to 4.00pm
we:
 Trimmed ivy from the wall between The Gardens and The Meeting House lands
 Sawed up some sizeable logs of old tree
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Moved two large heaps of non-compostable
brushwood (for the Council to take away, we hope)
Demolished and cleared out the decaying compost
bins
Carried out some light spring pruning
Removed the plastic protective sheets from around
the bases of the fruit trees
Surrounded all the tree bases with lovely wellmatured compost, absolutely seething with worms
Cleared away bags and bags of fallen leaves to
form new compost (with the smallest workers
treading down the leaves into the sacks with the
enthusiasm of grape treaders at harvest time)
 Started work on the flower and shrub border at
the SW corner of The Tasting Garden
 And lots more
All in all there was about 40 person hours work put in –
more than the average working week.
There are lots of positive signs of growth in The Gardens
– hellebores, fair daffodils, cyclamen, snowdrops, primroses – as well as burgeoning
leaf buds on the trees.
The Gardens are starting once again to look as though someone loves them – and it
was particularly good that Fiona, who has kept up a lot of maintenance work in The
Gardens virtually single-handed, is back from Australia and was able to see her
excellent work being built on.
Many thanks to all who came along and hope to see you all at the next session –
Sunday 7 April, 2-4pm.
PS – the council has removed all the rubbish we left for them – so now we can
progress.
Planning the Future
The Bulb Planting Project is only the first (we hope) of a wide range of projects which
will help us fulfil the aims of the group. Before we can take on board any further
projects, we have to have an agreed vision of what The Gardens might look like in two
years time, five years time, ten years time. At the meeting in March we agreed to hold a
planning session, rather along the lines of the Beyond the Castle meetings, where
people can record any or all of what they would like to see happening in The Gardens.
The general consensus was that a Sunday afternoon would suit most people, but NICE
which has been our regular meeting place so far does not open on a Sunday.
We have therefore booked the William Stout Room at The Friends Meeting House,
Meeting House Lane, Lancaster for Sunday 21 April from 2.30 to 5.30. Further
notification about what you might usefully bring along to assist in the planning process
will be circulated – but note the date in your diaries now.
Storey Gardens – a site for art
Next to the Storey Institute is a large walled garden, in two sections. This garden has
been an important place for environmental art for nearly 40 years. Andy Goldsworthy,
the internationally successful environmental artist, was a student here when the building
housed the art department of Preston Polytechnic, now the University of Central
Lancashire. He made his first artworks in the Storey Gardens in 1976.
The Tasting Garden by Mark Dion
The garden was neglected and inaccessible to the public for many years, but in 1998
Storey Gallery succeeded in attracting Tate Liverpool and the Henry Moore Foundation
to fund the creation of an environmental artwork, The Tasting Garden by Mark Dion,
and so to provide a tranquil green space in the centre of Lancaster.
The paths in The Tasting Garden are laid out in the form of the branches of a tree.
Referencing a family tree, or an evolutionary tree, the branch pathwork also evokes the
tree-of-life, a literary and visual metaphor with a rich cultural history.
Each of the four main branches of this tree-pathwork is planted with fruit trees (apple,
cherry, plum, and pear). Each small branch path leads to a particular variety, and next
to each tree is a plinth supporting a bronze sculpture of its fruit.
Many of the trees chosen for The Tasting Garden are rare or endangered varieties
which are threatened by the loss of small-scale farmlands or the shift to monoculture
agricultural production. Industrial farming privileges only a handful of plants which
exhibit commercially desirable traits such as long shelf-life, large yields, sweet taste,
and pest resistance. A number of breeds which have long been neglected, and which
offer a more expansive and challenging taste spectrum, were selected for The Tasting
Garden. They provide flavours and textures which are normally inaccessible to all but a
handful of expert cultivators.
In one corner of the Garden is The Arboriculturist's Workshed, a diminutive folly or
monument to the grand achievements and skills, in terms of both physical labour and
intellect, of the men and women who created this diversity of fruit varieties.
The Tasting Garden is a hybrid - part orchard and part artwork.
The Garden is an artwork - the artwork is a garden
Mark Dion is an internationally renowned American artist whose work incorporates
aspects of archaeology and ecology. His work explores the deeply conflicting ideas we
have about nature, and is exhibited internationally including : Tate Gallery, London;
Natural History Museum, London; Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Museum
of Art, Osaka, Japan.
Closure of the Garden
The garden was closed before refurbishment of the Storey Institute building began in
2007. Unfortunately The Tasting Garden was vandalised and the bronze fruits were
stolen in 2009, during the building refurbishment.
The owner of the artwork, Lancaster City Council, was discovered to have inadequate
insurance to cover this damage, and has taken no steps to re-instate this valuable
international status artwork.
Storey Gallery has been keen to restore The Tasting Garden, and has obtained
costings for doing that. However, it has been unable to proceed because there was no
provision for maintenance of the garden. The formation of the Friends of Storey
Gardens provides a potential opportunity for its restoration.
Pictures
Photographs of The Tasting Garden can be seen on the Storey Gallery website by
Googling “The Tasting Garden”, or “Storey Gardens”, or going to
http://www.storeygallery.org.uk/pages.php?page=000006.
John Angus
Open Day
The Lancaster Park BioBlitz day is taking place on Saturday 18 May and the meeting
agreed that we should open up The Storey Gardens to the public on the same day from
10.00 am to 2.00 pm with various money-making activities to try and feed our bank
account. A sub-group of the meeting is to draw up some detailed plans, but volunteers
will be needed to staff the entrances, run stalls and other activities and be on hand to
answer questions and encourage people to join the Friends. We hope as many
members as possible will come along. There will be a clip-board at the next meeting
(Tuesday 30 April) and perhaps members can sign up to indicate when they will be free.
As mentioned in the previous issue of the Newsletter, we would love to have donations
of plants, cakes, jams and marmalade, books etc. Start collecting now and redirect
those books you don’t want away from Oxfam for once towards the FOSG Open Day.
We plan to charge a small entrance fee – but anyone who joins FOSG and pays their
membership sub there and then will have the entry fee waived – there’s an inducement
to attend and to bring along anyone you know who is interested in joining.
Membership
The meeting agreed that the constitution should allow for a membership subscription £5.00 per year per adult or person over 14, and £8.00 per year for two adults sharing
the same address. Children 14 and under are free, but must be accompanied in The
Gardens by a responsible adult. We have not yet designed a membership form, but our
treasurer Michael Greenhalgh will be happy to accept membership subs as soon as
possible. Please make cheques payable to The Friends of The Storey Gardens and
pass them to Michael at 14 Castle Park Lancaster LA11YQ. Many thanks –
membership forms will be forthcoming soon.
Next Meeting
The next FOSG meeting will be held at 6.00 pm on Tuesday 30 April in the NICE
Restaurant – meet in the bar first. The next working session is 2-4 Sunday 7 April.
Copy for the Newsletter
Apologies – this issue is rather later than I advertised. Please send articles, comments,
letters etc for the April issue to me Sue Widden (sueandmart@o2.co.uk) by Sunday 21
April. Many thanks.
And thanks to Stephen for the series of lovely photographs of The Gardens