Dalston Curve Garden was closed to the public for five months this summer, in line with safety guidelines relating to the COVID-19 health emergency. The Garden is normally open 12 months of the year, but as we generate most of our income from April – September, this loss continues to have a seriously detrimental impact on the future of the Garden. We also incurred substantial costs by needing to make structural changes to our entrance area, before we could reopen, so that visitors could adhere to social distancing guidelines.
We launched our ‘Save Dalston Curve Garden’ Crowdfunder in July 2020 to try to raise £100,000 to pay for the building works, and to help ensure that the Garden could remain open for everyone to enjoy. We also are determined to continue to host our community mornings for groups of people who have been shielding and to spend the winter months planting an abundance of Spring-flowering bulbs and making even more improvements to the space for visitors to enjoy in 2021. To date, thanks to the generosity of over 2,700 donors we have raised over £80,000.
You can help us reach our Crowdfunder target to ensure that Dalston Curve Garden survives this challenging year, by clicking on the link below to our Crowdfunder.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/save-dalston-curve-garden
Over the Garden’s ten years of existence, our community of volunteers, visitors and supporters has helped the Garden survive and grow and together we have weathered any storms that have come our way. In this, the Curve Garden’s 10th anniversary year, we are determined that together we will weather this one and ensure that the Garden doesn’t just survive but thrives.
How the Dalston Curve Garden is Funded
We manage the Garden as an independent social enterprise. Our primary mission is to offer beautiful green space for everyone to enjoy, in a built up part of Hackney, where few people have their own gardens. We also offer a year-round programme of free educational workshops, children’s activities and community events and host a diverse range of Hackney community groups and organisations for gatherings and activities.
The income we make from sales in our Cafe is what pays for the Garden to remain open daily for 12 months a year and for our volunteering, educational and community programmes.