Good to Grow Day 2023
Good to Grow Day is a national weekend of action from Friday 21st to Monday 24th April for edible gardens to celebrate the new growing season, open their doors to the local community and encourage people to volunteer.
The dates for #GoodToGrow2023 are 21-24 April! Register your garden now.
Registration for this year's Good to Grow weekend of action is open. From the end of February, you'll be able to access all the resources from your Good to Grow member dashboard, to support your gardens celebrate community food growing this April.
Last year, thousands of volunteers took part in activites all across the UK. 92% of gardens that took part said it helped them provide more opportunities for people from different backgrounds to get involved in community growing.
“The highlight for us was everyone working together to achieve a lot in the garden and in the process learning a lot and having an enjoyable time together.”
If you haven't yet registered your garden as a member, it's free and takes five minutes. Anyone growing food in at least one square metre or more is eligible to join. Read more about the benefits.
Not already a member of Good to Grow? Join here
I'm involved in a growing space and would like to take part in Good to Grow 2023
The Good to Grow day event is a weekend of celebration for community gardens and growing networks. Typically, new and old volunteers and community members join forces to prepare beds, build structures, sow seeds and help with all the important jobs that need to be done in Spring. It’s an opportunity to meet new people, get your hands dirty and support and enjoy valuable community spaces.
I would like to join in or volunteer at Good to Grow 2023
Gardens and growing spaces across the UK will start populating the Good to Grow map with their plans for activities and events from mid February, so start checking the Good to Grow map from then. Alternatively, get directly in touch with your nearest gardent to express your interest.
The history
The Big Dig Day started as an event run by Capital Growth in 2012 to engage volunteers in local food growing projects. Funding was also received to roll this out across the UK , recruiting 7,500 new volunteers to take part in community gardening. These local networks continue to recruit and engage volunteers locally.
In 2019 the Big Dig Day took place on Saturday the 27th of April. The day went national with over 100 gardens participating from across the UK. People could use our interactive map to find a garden to volunteer with for the Big Dig day. Activities, hours and locations varied so that volunteers could find the right garden for them.
Since the Big Dig was first launched in 2012, a growing number of gardens have been adopting a 'no dig' approach to food growing and to reflect that we surveyed our members to find a new name that was more inclusive and representative of our network. After a great debate and lots of ideas, Good to Grow was voted in as the overwhelming favourite.
"Good to Grow is far more all encompassing in my opinion, great name!"
"Big Dig is just not appropriate to our project which is run on organic and no dig principles."
"Good to know, it might be - Good to Grow!"
"Good to Grow seems to me more inclusive"
