WHAT IS GUERRILLA GARDENING?
PEOPLE POWER
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FLOWER POWER
Guerrilla gardening is radically grassroots planting in public places – where purpose is more important than permission.
Guerrilla gardeners are green-fingered vigilantes who transform neglected corners of their neighbourhoods into vibrant pockets of plant life, benefitting both people and planet.
Guerrilla gardening can be an agile, anonymous solo mission, or a big group operation. It can mean planting bulbs in a street tree bed, scattering native wildflowers onto a bare road verge, or turning a vacant lot into a community allotment.
Whether your purpose is supporting biodiversity, creating beauty, growing food or supporting community, guerrilla gardening is where people power and flower power unite.
GROWING
Guerrilla gardening is about growing: adding to (not detracting from) the local ecosystem; creating life where before there was none. Unnecessary “weeding”, crop sabotage, and plant theft don’t cut the mustard.
PUBLIC PLACES
From wide open squares to hidden back alleys, guerrilla gardeners plant in shared spaces, bringing nature to the heart of neighbourhoods in ways that can benefit all residents, including local wildlife.
GRASSROOTS
The “guerrilla” aspect comes from being truly grassroots: growing entirely from the ground up, and without municipal influence or involvement. Guerrilla gardening unites flower power and people power.
IS IT LEGAL?
The legalities around guerrilla greening are, ironically, a grey area: ambiguous and inconsistent. Though there's no law specifically against guerrilla gardening itself, it sometimes gets lumped in with vandalism, or health and safety bylaws.
We're trying to change that, with LICENCE TO PLANT.
Despite what some might think about guerrilla gardeners, we don't just want to “break the rules” – we want to end them, and lift restrictions on grassroots greening.
By creating and tending gardens in public places, and showing how much local communities and ecosystems benefit as a result, we can help people (including lawmakers) envisage a world in which autonomous, community-led greening is a normal part of how cities are made (and kept) greener.
