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Our Newsletter
We produce a Newsletter four times a year, which is packed with news, information, photos and articles about everything that has been happening at Minstead Training Project. To download the latest Newsletter click on the download button to the right and the Newsletter will open in a new window. You will need Adobe Reader to view the Newsletter.
Furzey Gardens takes RHS Chelsea build-up by storm!
Update 15th May – 6 days to go!
Two weeks into the ‘Furzey Garden’ build at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show and Minstead’s Furzey team led by Chris Beardshaw is attracting a lot of attention as the world’s finest garden designers prepare to strut their stuff next week.
Not for us the multimillion-pound budgets, the artificially temperature-controlled plants or the likes of Diarmuid’s scaffolding tower which grows inorganically skyward over our shoulders. Oh no, the Furzey Garden is already a little sanctuary of New Forest sanity embedded like a little gem amongst the horticultural madness that transforms the Chelsea Showground into the greatest flower show in the world in three weeks flat.
The build started on the second of May in the pouring rain, and most days since then have seen a wet start. All of the heavy groundwork completed over the last two weeks has been achieved with heavy machinery, designers, horticulturalists, delivery people, organisers, helpers and labourers trudging around the site caked in mud. Yet there is a palpable air of excitement and bonhomie and our students with learning disabilities who are helping with the build are making quite an impression with their positive attitude to hard work and willingness to (literally) muck in.
Excitement is still building back at base in Hampshire as we make plans to welcome special guests and patrons Sir Michael and Lady Caine and Hugh and Katie Dennis onto the Furzey Garden on Press Day and then of course one of our lucky students and our Head Horticulturalist Pete White may get to show the HRH the Queen around the garden. In fact, when the Queen arrives ours will be the first garden she will see! (And of course no-one even whispers the m**** word).
Also back at base of course there is as much work going on as at Chelsea – preparing plants, stone, turf, treestumps, transporting from the nursery up the car park and then loading on to lorries and into vans. Then they have to be driven to Chelsea, unloaded and the vans driven back. The team are working very long hours and doing very intense, hard work.
As an unexpected aside show organiser Alex Denman has asked Trust Chairman Rev. Tim to do a ‘Thought for the Day’ for the RHS staff and he took the opportunity this Sunday to gently introduce the real purpose of the Furzey Garden at Chelsea:
Will there be Dandelions?
I recently received one of these unexpected gifts when I went to present a whole bunch of tickets to Oak Lodge School, our neighbours in the New Forest. Having explained our plans, one of the students asked me, rather hesitantly, “will there be Dandelions?”
Of course, the Dandelion is generally regarded as a weed. It is a humble, unpretentious flower that usually gets pulled up to make space for a plant of seemingly greater value. I was reminded of this last Friday when watching two tiny children playing on the last remaining patch of grass by Alex’s office. They were carefully, with evident delight and wonder, picking the rather overlooked Dandelions there, really appreciating the beauty of this humblest of flowers.
So thank you Alex and the RHS for the extended ticket scheme, because I was able to say to that student, “Yes, you will see at least one Dandelion in our Chelsea Garden.” My prayer for Chelsea for this and future years is that the humble and the unpretentious people will never be “weeded out”, but be given the pride of place God intends for them.
Thanks for listening,
Rev Tim.
Independent charities Furzey Gardens and The Minstead Training Project work together to provide training for people with learning disabilities to enable them to lead fulfilled lives. People have asked us why we are spending money on a Chelsea garden when we are at the same time protesting about funding cuts for people with moderate learning disabilities, and it is a fair question. We answer, firstly, that all monies involved have been raised for the Chelsea Project itself, and are entirely separate so neither charity has diverted money away from students. Secondly, we explain that we wanted to find a way to bring to the attention of a wider audience the role that people with learning disabilities could play in our society given the same opportunities afforded to the rest of us.
Most of us feel that what we do in our lives says something about who we are and this gives us a sense of pride. Many people with learning disabilities are given the message (by the way the world responds to them and the lack of opportunities available to them) that they cannot do much and therefore are denied the feeling of pride in contributing to their own wellbeing or the world around them.
During the last decade positive initiatives such as Valuing People and Valuing People Now were introduced aiming to offer more opportunities and choice to those with moderate learning disabilities. However today, in an effort to meet budgets, local authorities are being forced to close services for people with moderate learning disabilities, reduce the number of days that people can access services and reduce personal budgets to levels that are insufficient for people to purchase the support that they need. This will lead to loss of self-esteem, self-efficacy, confidence and skills and will also result in social isolation and increased vulnerability due to lack of structured daytime activities and loss of support for leisure activities. This short term cost-cutting will result ultimately in some people with moderate learning disabilities leading lonelier, less fulfilled, less independent lives than they have the potential to achieve.
Martin Lenaerts, director of The Minstead Training Project explains that “The Project is intent on providing a service that puts the individual at the centre of a service that helps people move on in their lives. Despite financial difficulties we are determined to continue to charge a reasonable, as opposed to cheap, rate for our services so that we can meet individual need”.
Our Chelsea team is made up of designer Chris Beardshaw and our staff, volunteers and students with learning disabilities, and these students have been intimately involved with every element of the project from the start. We want to show that with opportunity and appropriate support people with moderate learning disabilities can achieve way beyond what people might expect. We want to celebrate excellence and want Chelsea visitors and the public to be impressed and surprised - but we also want people to understand the potential impact that current Government policy will have on one of the most vulnerable and utterly voiceless groups in our society. We want people to be outraged, to speak up on behalf of those who find it difficult to speak for themselves and be motivated to act.
