Pocket Garden Stories | Burnside PS
The Living Garden, hosted by the Garden for Life Forum promotes wildlife friendly gardening. Schools were invited to design a small garden including celebrating the 2017 year of History, Heritage and Archaeology. “Look maw, its the rag n’ bone man” this Pocket Garden is a blast from the past and recalls the tradition of re-using in this colourful design of a rag n’ bone cart bursting with plants and personality.
Every garden tells a story about the people who helped make it, the challenges faced, solutions found, lessons learned and the unexpected pleasures along the way. Here is Burnside Primary’s Pocket Garden story in their own words.
The first person I interviewed was Jim. He said the rag and bone man came to his street. Jim gave me 2 books of old photographs of Glasgow. My mum said that when she was little she remembered the rag n bone man visiting in the summer.
She remembers looking out the window and hearing him shout. It was really exciting because he would bring the horse and cart down the street. My mum said that all the gardens in the street had pretty flowers in the summer.
Her gran grew fuchsias which my mum thought were really exotic. She had peonies and roses, her neighbour’s garden was full of bright tom thumbs. Her mum grew gooseberries and rhubarb which they dipped in sugar. They always had pea-pods in the summer that they would eat from a big bowl and share.
My dad found a pallet and brought it home. He fixed the pallet in the garage and made the seat for the cart. I have had to re think some of my plant choices as my drawing detailed flowers/foods that would not be in bloom in early June. It has been a challenge to find other suitable plants which still stick to my original ideas
A piece of Glasgow's history
Building the garden base
Getting help with cutting the pallet
