Link
to Phase I Map
The aim of the Guelph Enabling
Garden is to provide a fully accessible working/teaching garden for
all Guelph and community citizens. It is designed to be a destination
for visitors to enjoy nature and the healing it provides. It will be
a garden that can be both actively used and passively enjoyed. Workshops
will be offered throughout the year that relate to various gardening
aspects including assisting those with their own garden challenges,
as well as for school-aged children, seniors and those with varying
abilities.
Glynis Logue has worked with
GEG since 1999 to design the garden and coordinate the building of Phase
One. Contact her at (519) 763-7510 if you have any specific questions
about the garden's detail.
Let’s
Take a Tour of the Guelph Enabling Garden:
Phase One of the plan includes
a woodland garden, spiral garden, outdoor sculpture gallery and community
garden plots.
You will enter the garden on a main pathway built to accommodate wheelchairs,
walkers and clients with low vision. The surface will be smooth and
flat, with good traction. The pathway will have textural and visual
markers and will be wide enough to allow 2 wheelchairs to pass.
The fully accessible community
garden plots will highlight teaching, working and growing your favorite
plants. You will find raised garden planters built at different heights
for those in wheelchairs and those who wish to sit or stand. A wooden
arbour and hanging baskets will create a sense of enclosure for workshops.
Next to this area will be a fully accessible shed to house our supplies,
water and hydro access. Ground beds will also be built to connect the
community garden with a gallery of sensory sculptures.
Carry on through the garden
and you will come to a spiral garden that looks over the river and a
quiet wooded area to rest and enjoy nature. Sit under a native tree,
listen to the birds or enjoy a picnic.
The Guelph Enabling Garden
will be a unique experience that stimulates all senses through active
and passive spaces.
Plant Material:
Plantings used in an enabling
garden are chosen for fragrance, texture, sight, sound, and taste. Native
plants will be used to demonstrate how we can learn to grow gardens
that do not rely on water and chemicals. Environmental gardening will
also be explored through activities such as composting.