Artist Frances Disley has been working with The Turnpike CIC and members of the Leigh community to establish a healing and sustainable garden for Leigh’s town centre. Using the local ecology as inspiration, Frances has developed a series of planting schemes that occupy the existing 1971 flower beds outside of The Turnpike Centre on Leigh’s Civic Square.
Outside the Turnpike Centre, each flower bed has its own theme according to the properties of the plants.
Plants selected for their healing properties, including calendula, comfrey, St John’s wort, yarrow, witch hazel and lavender.
Herbs that can be brewed for tea, including a variety of mints, camomile, lavender and oatstraw.
A blend of plants that offer extraordinary scents that calm and stimulate the senses, including jasmine, sage, mint, nicotiana and rose.
Including motherwort, dog rose, liquorice and hawthorn
Plants that create natural dyes and pigments, including woad, madder, indigo, calendula and sunflowers
The Turnpike Centre Garden provides a community hub, a space for re-imagining the Civic Square, for promoting the greening of public spaces, for wellbeing activities and an education space for local children.
A publication, Talk to the Garden has been produced by Frances Disley in collaboration with the designer Holly Eliza Temple and will be available from Summer 2022. Reflecting the ethos and wisdom inherent within the garden, the book has contributions from Rasheeqa Ahmad (Rasheeqa Ahmad – The Nest Collective), Sean Roy Parker (Sean Roy PARKER, Member in London – Members | Axisweb: Contemporary Art UK Network), Andrea Ku (Bluecoat | Andrea Ku (thebluecoat.org.uk)) and Rebecca Lazarou (Rebecca Lazarou | Plants, Science, Healing RebeccaLazarou).
The project is delivered as part of Wanderland, a creative partnership with Lancashire Wildlife Trust which forms a connection between urban and local green spaces.
A huge thank you to our supporters on this project: Brighter Borough, Kenyon Hall Farm, Lancashire Wildlife Trust and Wigan Council.
