New British magazine.

“Well Clayton in Manchester was just about the most inner city district in the country and we lived the ‘Good Life’ there. Only we didn’t really know it was the good life – it was just life. In amongst the back streets, where everything was purple from the dye works or noisy and full of smoke from the wireworks, we had hens and their eggs, pigs for their meat, and by the river there was an old man who kept sheep with whom we’d do a swap – a clutch of plucked hens for half a lamb.

“Within sight of my bedroom you could see the remains of Manchester United’s first stadium, the power station, a dozen factories, including the one that the Germans bombed, my school, rows of back to back houses and a few dozen little farms, because we all did our own. Own food, own furniture, own everything really.”

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As food prices soar, could a project that saw fruit and vegetables grown in town-centre planters and parks be a blueprint for the future?

Urban Farming Initiative, Middlesbrough, England, U.K.
Article in The Guardian, March 26, 2008

“People visiting Middlesbrough last year may have wondered why there were radishes and pumpkins being grown where they might have expected to see carnations and dahlias. All over the town, disused urban spaces were turned into fertile corners bursting with freshly grown fruit and vegetables as more than 1,000 residents took part in a project aimed at changing the way they think about food. This year, the results could be even more spectacular.

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