On Saturday 18th May, one of our volunteers opened her beautiful Bankhead Garden as part of the National Garden Scheme, and at the same time collected donations for Save the Family with a selection of homemade refreshments, gifts, and garden related products for visitors to snap up.
What is the National Garden Scheme?
We will let the organisation speak for themselves here:
“The National Garden Scheme gives visitors unique access to over 3,500 exceptional private gardens in England, Wales, Northern Ireland, and the Channel Islands, and raises impressive amounts of money for nursing and health charities through admissions, teas, and cake.
Thanks to the generosity of garden owners, volunteers, and visitors we have donated over £70 million to nursing and health charities and in 2023 made an annual donation of over £3.4 million. Our core beneficiaries include Macmillan Cancer Support, Marie Curie, Hospice UK, and The Queen’s Nursing Institute.
The National Garden Scheme doesn’t just open beautiful gardens for charity – we are passionate about the physical and mental health benefits of gardens too. We also support charities doing amazing work in gardens and health and grant bursaries to help community gardening projects.”
For more information, head to their website (and find other gardens still open for visitors this year!)
How did the Event go?
It was a sunny and warm day on Saturday, with just the occasional cloud. This beautiful weather meant that Bankhead welcomed a total of 89 paying visitors who enjoyed a lovely afternoon in the garden!
We sold a variety of things for donations, the most popular being refreshments of tea, coffee, and a variety of homemade cakes! The garden-based gifts such as plants also went down well, and a total of £562 was raised for Save the Family!
Everyone at Save the Family would like to thank all visitors who enjoyed their visit to such a superb garden. Our staff who volunteered on the day were kept very busy, but an incredibly enjoyable day was had by all – including Wilson (resident pup)!
