Friends of Craigtoun – garden restoration
The Friends of Craigtoun Country Park were awarded £3000 towards the restoration of the Lodge Garden, providing the local community with improved access to green spaces.
Craigtoun is a 47-acre public park located just two miles from St Andrews. The Friends of Craigtoun Country Park group was formed in 2012 with the aim of securing the future of the park as an amenity for the people of St Andrews and Fife, as well as visitors to the area.
Craigtoun Country Park’s Lodge Garden was in a state of disrepair and required substantial works to be carried out to restore it to its former beauty. Funding from the University Community Fund will support the restoration of the garden.
Activities include:
- considerable de-weeding and clearance of overgrown shrubbery
- construction of retaining walls
- construction of raised beds and a plantation area
- the repair of the existing garden pond.
The restoration of the Lodge Garden will be extremely beneficial to the local community, restoring what was an existing horticultural area back to its original beauty and allowing the local community to use this facility as a community garden.
Local groups can use the garden area to enhance gardening skills and grow various types of produce and garden plants all year round.
It will allow groups to develop teamwork and responsibility, whilst offering the challenges of growing plants and the reward of seeing them flourish.
The Lodge Garden will be used as a teaching aid to promote knowledge exchange, diversity and inclusion, development of social skills, mental health wellbeing and also help people to gain an understanding of the environment.
Craigtoun was one of the organisations that benefited from the student-run Community Action Day in October 2020, when volunteers undertook a range of activities at the park to support its ongoing maintenance.