Description
Life in Brixton is a photo series captured by award-winning photographer Myah Jeffers and features community gardens and historic landmarks across Brixton.
Life in Brixton explores the pockets of growth, sustainability and eco-action by community members and volunteers, as well as highlights the potential to access green spaces within urbanised inner-city environments.
Our Christmas show, Cinderella, is a locally-inspired alternative of the classic tale and places Sindi-Ella in the heart of her community, celebrates her love of growing plants, and honours her late father, a market trader and greengrocer.
Through the Life in Brixton series, we hope to inspire people to visit their local community gardens, connect with growing your own, learn horticultural skills, and develop an appreciation for green spaces and living sustainably in busy, urban towns.
Coming to watch Cinderella? Or perhaps you’re popping into Brixton House for either a coffee or a meeting? While you wait, feel free to pop into our foyer and have a look at the Life in Brixton exhibition which will be open every day from 10am-8pm until Sunday 31st December.
You can purchase tickets to see Cinderella here. Cinderella will be showing until Sunday 31st December.
Featuring Cinderella cast members Yanexi Enriquez (Sindi-Ella) and Ray Emmet Brown (Delphy/Amir), Valcie of Athltra Gardens & Allotments, ‘Cowboy’ of Douglas Castle and volunteers Allen Turing and Priscilla Amankwah of Brixton Windmill.
Special thanks to the following for their help and support of the series:
Michael Douglas aka Cowboy
Catherine Hamilton of Brixton Windmill
Bobby Holder of Loughborough Park Community Park
Eliza Infante of Myatt’s Field Community Garden
Valcie of Papa’s Cafe & Chair of Athltra Gardens & Allotments
Femi Tiwo
Photo series commissioned by Brixton House.
Find out more about the community gardens in our Life of Brixton series:
Myatt’s Fields Park
Myatt’s Fields Park has a long history of community support. During the war, it provided shelter for families. The park is named after Joseph Myatt, a tenant market gardener who grew food here during the 19th century. More recently, MFPP has run many events and projects in the park, including Food Heroes – a Big Lottery-funded multigenerational programme bringing together local people to cook and share meals. For the last 5 years, the community greenhouse at Myatt’s Fields Park has grown over 60 thousand seedlings per year for more than 50 food-growing projects, including for local estates, community gardens and allotments, schools and sister charities, as well as many edible plants for our neighbours and the park. We run volunteer food growing sessions and cooking sessions as well as park gardening sessions. They have co-managed the park in collaboration with Lambeth Council since 2015. The team would not be able to keep the park looking stunningly beautiful and welcoming without the help of our litter picker volunteers. For the second consecutive year, they have won Golden London in Bloom, kept the Green Flag, and been voted in the top 10 local favourite parks in the UK. Myatt’s Field Park has 126 active volunteers working together to make the park a wonderful place for the local community.
Friends of Windmill Gardens
The Friends of Windmill Gardens is a local residents’ group set up in 2003 to campaign to restore, preserve and enhance Brixton Windmill and Windmill Gardens. FoWG was first registered as a charity in 2007 and, in 2018, was re-established as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (1176991), with the aims to support the restoration, preservation and continued use of Grade II* listed Windmill. The Brixton Windmill Centre opened in July 2020 as part of the charity’s aims to build a unique education facility for schools and the local community that will put the windmill and its history into context. FoWG works to enhance the park by creating a green oasis to benefit local residents – adults, young people and children – and attract visitors and windmill enthusiasts from further afield. And to provide community events that bring local people together to celebrate and enjoy this unique historic building and open space.
The Athltra Gardens & Allotments
The Athltra Garden & Allotments committee oversees the operations of the garden. They have 32 plots used by 60 active members who volunteer their time to grow fruits and vegetables, including pumpkins, corn, and chocho. The Athltra Garden & Allotment have been awarded the Incredible Edible Lambeth award for Best Community Garden, in addition to other awards, recognizing the work they do within the Brixton community. Events are also held in the summer and autumn. The garden also has bees which are looked after by beekeepers and produce honey, plus there’s an area allocated for children to grow their own vegetables.
Douglas Castle
Situated in the middle of Hereford Estate, Douglas Castle is a community garden founded by Michael Douglas aka Cowboy and has been operating for the past five years with the help of people of all ages and abilities within the estate and across Brixton. Cowboy, who has lived in Hereford Estate for over 20 years, developed Douglas Castle after a building and nursery in the middle of the estate was destroyed. Flowers of all kinds and vegetables such as callaloo, potato, onion, pumpkin, cabbage, cauliflower and much more are grown across each season, with Spring being the prime time to see the garden in bloom.
Douglas Castle caters to pensioners and vulnerable people within Brixton and Cowboy aims to help by providing free food to those who are in need. Cowboy is also seeking support and if you are thinking of making donations such as fertiliser, seedlings and soil, pop down to Douglas Castle!