What is Horticultural Therapy at Greener Growth?

What is Horticultural Therapy at Greener Growth?

Horticultural therapy at Greener Growth is the practice of using nature, gardening, and hands-on outdoor activity to support people’s wellbeing, confidence, and sense of connection. At its heart, it’s about helping people rediscover something deeply human: the grounding, calming, creative experience of working with soil, plants, food, and the rhythms of the natural world.

A gentle, accessible way to reconnect with nature

Many people today feel disconnected from the outdoors, from where food comes from, from the seasons, and even from their own creativity. Horticultural therapy offers a way back. It gives people a safe, supported space to slow down, breathe, and engage with something living.

At Greener Growth, this isn’t about perfect gardens or technical knowledge. It’s about:

Touching soil and feeling grounded
Growing food and understanding nourishment
Creating habitats and seeing wildlife return
Using hands and imagination to shape something meaningful
Finding balance through routine, care, and gentle physical activity

These simple acts can have a profound impact on mental and emotional wellbeing.

How Greener Growth approaches horticultural therapy

Our approach is practical, inclusive, and rooted in real community spaces. We work with schools, prisons, community groups, businesses, and individuals, adapting activities so everyone can take part, regardless of age, ability, or experience.

Key elements of our work:

Hands-on gardening — planting, sowing, weeding, harvesting
Nature-based creativity — building planters, crafting with natural materials, designing wildlife areas
Food growing — helping people understand where food comes from and how to grow it themselves using highly productive, low maintenance permaculture based systems
Wildlife-friendly projects — creating habitat havens, ponds, hedgerows, and pollinator spaces
Mindful outdoor activity — encouraging people to notice, observe, and feel present
Recycling & Repurposing/Reusing materials - gives people a sense of how to grow sustainably
Rainwater Capture - where possible we will always install rainwater capture systems, to help ensure the project is sustainable

Every session is designed to build confidence, spark curiosity, and give people a sense of ownership over the spaces they help create.

Why horticultural therapy matters

Working with nature has a unique ability to support wellbeing. Research consistently shows that gardening and outdoor activity can:

Reduce stress and anxiety
Improve mood and focus
Build physical strength and coordination
Encourage social connection
Boost self-esteem through visible progress
Provide a sense of purpose and routine
In prisons and probation services - help to improve employability

But beyond the science, there’s something instinctive about it. Humans are meant to be in relationship with the natural world. When people spend time outdoors, tending to plants or creating wildlife habitats, they often rediscover a sense of balance they didn’t realise they were missing.

Growing people as well as places

At Greener Growth, we believe that rewilding isn’t just about landscapes, it’s about people too. When someone plants a seed, watches it grow, or sees wildlife return to a space they helped create, something shifts. They feel part of something bigger. They feel capable. They feel connected.

Horticultural therapy gives people the tools to:

Explore their creativity
Build resilience
Learn new skills
Take pride in their environment
Feel more rooted in their community
Engaging with others

And as people grow, so do the spaces around them…greener, richer, more alive.

A pathway to healthier communities

The impact of horticultural therapy ripples outward. Healthier individuals create healthier communities. Greener spaces support biodiversity. Food-growing projects strengthen local resilience. And people who feel connected to nature are more likely to protect it.

This is why horticultural therapy sits at the heart of Greener Growth’s mission: it brings together wellbeing, education, community, and environmental restoration in one accessible, joyful practice.

If this sounds like something your company, school, prison, or community, would like to benefit from, get in touch!

Visit our website: www.greenergrowth.co.uk or get in touch with [email protected]

Jo Metcalfe on Suffolk Sound: National Tree Week and Springfield Junior School

Our founder Jo Metcalfe joined Karen Cannard on Suffolk Sound during National Tree Week to discuss our work across Suffolk, from corporate biodiversity projects to an exciting school transformation in Ipswich.

Corporate Services: Riduna Park

Karen and Jo visited our flagship site at Riduna Park, Melton, where we manage the grounds around East Suffolk Council offices. The tour showcased our pond tables—raised ponds designed for both wildlife and staff wellbeing. Staff use the nature-rich space during breaks, with over 20 local residents now regularly walking the site to enjoy the wildlife.

Protecting Veteran Trees

During National Tree Week, Jo highlighted the importance of protecting ancient trees. An oak can support 200 different species of wildlife and takes around 150 years to die—providing crucial habitat throughout its decline. We now work with specialist ecologists to advise corporate clients on tree management, following the Ancient Tree Forum's approach to preserving these national treasures.

Springfield Junior School: Creating a Green Oasis

We're transforming Springfield Junior School's playground in Ipswich. With 341 children—many without gardens—the school currently has a tarmac expanse that needs greening.

The £30,000 project will feature:

Raised beds with bench seating
Vertical planting on walls and fences
Pergolas for shade and shelter
Tree pits maintained by students

We've secured £13,000 so far from the school, Evolution Academy grants, and Suffolk Masonic Lodges. We're calling on Ipswich businesses to help us reach our target within six months through sponsorship or volunteer events.

Schools Work

We deliver horticultural therapy across Suffolk schools, with 27 currently on our waiting list. Our programmes teach children about food growing, wildlife conservation, and native species—many have never seen a frog or toad. For students who struggle with classroom learning, these outdoor spaces can be transformative.

Get Involved

Support Springfield Junior School: Contact us about sponsorship or volunteering opportunities.

Corporate Services: Every corporate contract helps fund our work with SEND schools and vulnerable communities. We support biodiversity net gain, staff wellbeing initiatives, and CSR objectives.

Listen to the full interview on Suffolk Sound. Contact us to discuss your project.

HMP Highpoint Gardens

HMP Highpoint Gardens Blooming

A little glimpse into our gardens at HMP Highpoint Prison at Stradishall, near Haverhill, Suffolk. They looked so stunning when we were there last week! The chair was made by one of the guys and Willow Geoff. Very comfortable. Great work!

Prisoners contribute to school fair

Bury Free Press

Greener Growth, community group organised a garden fair at Howard Primary School with plants grown by prisoners from Highpoint Prison.

The garden fair was organised to raise money to create a shaded area for the early years outdoor space at the school.

Jo Metcalfe, founder of Greener Growth, said: “I was really impressed with the children.”

The fair raised around £180 by selling plants that the prisoners from Highpoint had planted with the resources provided by Greener Growth.

Ms Metcalfe said: “Quite a few people in prison aren’t academic but they’re good with their hands, this kind of work allows them to get into a landscape profession when they leave.”

Advice for a greener garden

Having a day in the garden is one thing, but growing spaces need regular nurturing. It all depends on what you plant, of course! We work with disadvantaged communities to help them establish green areas where they can conserve nature, grow food and protect wildlife. There’s a lot of groundwork involved in our projects, but they run for much longer than that.

We believe looking after your growing space, abiding by the principles of permaculture, is beneficial for people’s wellness, both body and mind. The therapeutic, productive and conservation elements of permaculture are too good to be ignored. To help further promote this, we’ve compiled some insider tips and tricks to help you maintain your growing space. Turn your surroundings into an organic paradise!

10 garden-boosting tips

Planting parsley, dill, fennel and other nectar-producing plants will attract more wildlife to your space like ladybugs.
You ought to water plants in the morning. This will help avoid fungal diseases often spread by high humidity.
In general plants with thinner leaves need more water and those with thicker leaves need less.
An easy way to boost your growing space is companion planting. Pair up plants that balance-out each other’s nutritional needs, so one replenishes what the other takes from the soil.
Help keep pests and disease at bay by rotating your crops.
Plants with longer growing seasons need more compost in the soil to provide more nutrients and organic matter.
Compost is also needed for new beds, plus double digging and soil amendments to get it off to a great start.
If you have some spare compost, don’t let it go to waste. Cover it with tarpaulin to protect the nutrients within.
Making compost tea is a great way to use leftover compost. Mix 50:50 compost to water and let it rest before pouring onto soil around your healthy plants. For smaller seedlings however mix compost and water 1:4.
Acid-loving plants love mulch with coffee grounds

Find out more by completing our contact form.

Going back to basics with prisoners

We created courses for our beneficiaries as many of them haven’t had the opportunity to cook fresh food, let alone learn how to budget before. An essential part of our work with prisons is to support new food-growing projects, but it’s also important to teach the prisoners how to cook the food they’ve grown. Knowing how to grow, source, prepare and cook food, so it retains as much nutrition as possible, is such a vital tool that many of us take for granted.

Our courses include top tips such as growing and eating seasonal foods, foraging ideas, and where to find fresh food on a tight budget.

Cooking on a Shoe String

During one of these sessions at HMP Hollesley Bay almost everything we cooked was grown in the prison gardens. In addition we bought 3 chickens from the supermarket; one cheap, one medium-priced and one higher-priced free-range chicken.

The idea was to demonstrate that, although the cheapest might seem the best, when they were all cooked the more expensive represented better value as it did not shrink, was tastier and more filling. Ethics aside, free range animals have so much more exercise that a single chicken would provide you with four meals instead of two! We explained that animals stressed by battery conditions are often fed more chemicals such as antibiotics and they contain more fat having had little or no exercise.

As a group we also discussed the basic dry goods that you should aim to have in your store cupboard, like couscous, brown rice, onions, garlic and soy sauce, so if things get tight towards the end of the week you can still make a meal.

The proof is in the pudding (or the chicken)

The cooking! We looked at what we had in our kitchen store cupboard and on this occasion everyone chose what they wanted to make. We made pizzas, with fresh herb bases adding nutrition as well as taste, chicken and fresh vegetable topping. There was also roast chicken with roasted vegetables, chicken soup and vegetable ratatouille. We then sat together and shared the food we’d made.

Just as we finished clearing up one of the younger men gave us one of the two small pizzas he’d made. He loves pizza. This was his way of saying thank you and it made the entire day even more worthwhile.

Each time we run the course (once a fortnight) we get three or four people knocking on the door, asking if they can be put on the list for next time. It seems to be a valuable and popular initiative at the prison!

If this is something you’d like to get involved with, or you have any other ideas, please do get in touch.

Greener Growth Garden Makeovers: The method

Greener Growth Garden Makeovers: The Method

Our garden makeovers are different in that they offer excellent value, enhance biodiversity and are incredibly high yielding as far as produce is concerned, but also low maintenance!

Seeing the potential

Throughout the project we work with and emphasise the excellent principles of permaculture. But firstly we listen to what you want to achieve in your growing space, whatever size it may be. We don’t necessarily call it a garden as not everyone has one, but that shouldn’t stop you developing your growing space. We’ll show you how our Greener Growth Garden Makeovers can help you can grow food and nature almost anywhere.

Once we understand what you’d like us to help you create and achieve, we then map and zone the area. Now this is where the principles of permaculture really come into play. We let nature do the talking and guide us to plan a space that is good for you and your environment. Here are nine things we consider:

What is already growing well?
Are there any micro-climates? These could be little pockets of warmth, extra sunshine, shelter or moisture that help dictate planting regimes.
What is the area orientation – do you have a South-facing area?
Where and how can we create easy access to things that need regular attention?
Have you already got materials we can recycle and use? The answer is almost always yes!
How can we maximise sustainability and your resources?
Would vertical or container growing be suitable?
A planting plan that helps maintain soil fertility and productivity.
Could you make your own soil through mulching & composting by collecting green waste?

Getting down to work

We draw out what we think would work best to help you achieve your goals and maximize the potential of your space. Then it’s your turn. We discuss what you’d like to grow, harvest and eat from your garden, and what wildlife needs your help. Greener Growth doesn’t just turn up, do the job and leave. We prefer to get people as involved with the project as they want to be, teaching them as we ‘work’ together. A garden makeover shouldn’t feel like work though, creating something from ‘nothing’ is so much fun! For families looking to ‘up skill’ getting the children involved is a great idea, helping them take ownership of their space and playing an active role in nature conservation.

When doing a garden makeover we usually create the new infrastructure in the dormant winter months. This isn’t set in stone, but it is easier and less disruptive to pre-existing nature, taking shelter, hibernating or otherwise.

Helping yourself and others

Yes, there is a cost to having a garden makeover, but as a community interest company any profits we make are fed back into our community projects. So while you enjoy a beautiful and productive growing space, you’re also helping disadvantages and less fortunate people in the community. But that doesn’t mean a Greener Growth Garden Makeover is expensive, it’s still less than usual garden makeover designers & landscapers.

Read more about our Greener Growth Garden Makeovers and if you’re interested in our services for your own growing space, simply get in touch here.