Visitors are invited to stroll through and enter a delightful otherworld made almost entirely from repurposed waste materials*. Meet Stanley the Snail, Saffron O’Hara, Pancake the Turtle, Luna the Owl and all of the wonderful animals inhabiting this magical garden. Join a free story session or workshop and unleash your creativity and imagination.

To create this installation, local artists Mary Banker and Eliana Peracchio crafted a large papier-mache tree from paper waste and discarded wire mesh and led 400 local schoolchildren on a journey of making and wonder in a series of 18 workshops over two weeks. The children collected, reimagined and transformed everyday packaging waste into colourful flowers, plants and creatures to bring to life an enchanted garden full of whimsical creations and uplifting messages of hope.

Experience, explore and add your own voice to this inspirational piece – at once a vibrant celebration of nature and a call to action on the global waste crisis.

*In order to keep the project as close to zero waste as possible, art supplies and materials were donated by members of local community-based zero waste organisations including Buy Nothing Blackheath/Charlton/Lewisham, London.

We’ll be announcing some workshops in the coming weeks, so follow @garden_of_hope_project on Instagram for updates.