Radical with a rake: Meet Richard Reynolds

Richard Reynolds is the founder of GuerrillaGardening.org, a grassroots group he started in 2004 with his illicit cultivation of patches of ground near his home in the Elephant and Castle, London.

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With its slogan 'Let's Fight the Filth with Forks and Flowers', it promises a call to action, urging people to join 'the war against neglect and scarcity of public space', by taking action to transform derelict urban places.

Here, he talks to Geoff Andrews about the principles of radical gardening, the Royal Weeding, and International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day.

Creative Commons Image Roo Reynolds under CC-BY-NC licence

You set up GuerrillaGardening.org in 2004. Why?

I started GuerrillaGardening.org as a genteel protest, a mild provocation. I have no garden myself and I saw an opportunity. What I really wanted was an attractive, healthy and sustainable local environment. Then, I found that there were Guerrilla Gardeners in New York and Toronto, and realised there was a larger movement.

Pretty rapidly, I started receiving a constant flow of messages in my inbox. I had no great ambition to make it into the big, loose global movement it is today, but I was keen to link up and join dots together, and get involved with things other people were doing.

I'm an optimistic and pragmatic activist, and my approach is just to go and do it. It grew quickly amongst friends and neighbours, and then in 2006, two years after I started, I appeared on You and Yours on Radio 4, which had a significant impact.

How big has the Guerrilla Gardener movement become? Can you give a sense of its impact in the UK and beyond?

Since then GuerrillaGardening.org has grown rapidly and I have had a constant flow of messages of support. My newsletter comes out once every six months and I have a database of 60,000.

I know that not all those who sign up are active Guerrilla Gardeners, but they want to know more. The first of May was International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day - over 3000 people signed up on Facebook in support.

The core of your campaign is to make use of abandoned urban spaces. To what extent does your work incorporate a broader aim of democratising public space?

That is exactly what we are doing. I could see that there was scarcity and neglect in my area of the Elephant and Castle and when these two things come together there is an opportunity to do something . I wanted to gently provoke the council into allowing me to carry on.

Either I'm ignored or I have verbal unofficial approval from local authorities. Most of the time, I am content with that.

People have lost interest in the public realm, and feel powerless, and retreat to their private domains. It is hugely satisfying to bring people together and chat to neighbours.

Some gardeners are extroverts by nature and it is nice to share results. Once you get over the fear that it will be vandalised, it can be hugely satisfying.

I grew up in Devon and I now live in a very different place. There is not too much conflict from the public or authorities. Most of the public don't notice it but there are plenty who do and encourage you to keep on going, beeping car horns as they go past.

This is partly a result of my raising awareness of what Guerrilla Gardening is about. I hope by stopping and talking to people that it becomes a two way thing, to show that gardening can be fun and they get the encouragement to do the same.

The Guerilla Gardener
Planting tulips at a motorway service area

The perception of gardening is often that of a sedate, semi-rural pastime. How successful have you been in challenging these perceptions?

I'm keen to change that perception. Much of the gardening media is stuffy and conservative and gives the impression that gardening is only for those who have years of experience behind them or who have money to spend on the best quality gardening equipment.

For them, amateur gardening is the thing you do in primary school. I want to change all that. 

My objective is to get more people involved and enjoying it and taking responsibility in their local community. Some of my generation can feel guilty about gardening for fun, but there is no need.

While you are primarily concerned with the 'horticultural' frontline, to what extent do you see yourself part of the local food movements?

It is one of the objectives. Some people come to Guerrilla Gardening because they want to 'grow their own'. We face big obstacles because of the pollution in some urban areas. For me, edible Guerrilla Gardening is more of a symbolic exercise where people are seen planting cabbages and raspberries which says 'look, food can grow here'.

Even if this is not high quality food, it makes the case for growing your own in your back garden easier.

If you were to pick one story which sums up the impact of the Guerrilla Gardeners, what would it be?

My focus more is on micro-plots because it removes the barrier of organising in great groups. On International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day, we planted seeds in small batches around the neighbourhood.

Events like this bring joy to a lot of people and the results are hugely satisfying. Planting sunflowers carry lots of different positive messages.

Finally, we are talking over the Royal Wedding weekend which I see you have renamed 'Royal Weeding'. How did that come about?

It was an opportunistic attempt to get people to do some Guerrilla Gardening. It has proved popular with both monarchists and republicans and it is an opportunity for couples to do some gardening together. I must give credit to friends from the Brockley group, who came up with this idea of genius. I thought: Why don't I do it?

Find out more

On Guerilla Gardening by Richard Reynolds is published by Bloomsbury Publishing