Spurred by a phone call, Carolyn Mackin, an active community volunteer and member of the Chew Playground advisory board, started weeding the overgrown corner of 18th & Ellsworth Streets with a fellow volunteer. Once the weeds were sufficiently uprooted, Mackin sought help constructing raised beds (from reclaimed wood) and a grant to transform the then bare ground.
Each summer Chew welcomes twenty campers ranging in age from 4-14 for camp. These campers are supervised by a dedicated staff led by Octavia Cherry. Cherry explained that she and her “babies” always had a desire to grow a garden at Chew, but lacked the tools and know-how to sustain one. When Macklin’s succeed in securing a grant from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS), this guidance would finally come to Chew in the form of Sean Roulan, a landscape designer with several years experience developing children’s gardens.
With Roulan onboard and the enthusiasm of the Chew campers, a once overgrown and weeded corner of the city was transformed into a thriving center of biodiversity. The campers participated in every aspect of the garden’s growth from digging holes and watering heat-scorched plants, to plucking ripe raspberries off the bush. Now more educated than your average urban gardener, these kids can identify plants by characteristics like leaf shape, smell and taste. They can tell you when the green peppers will ripen and that there is a strange peculiar hole in one of the petunias. But beyond the facts of flora and fauna, these kids have experienced something even more significant, what Roulan refers to a “transformation.”
As the garden grew, the kids’ perspective changed. Once accustomed to “cellophane packaged lunches and Hugs” the young gardeners developed a knowledge of gardening and self-sufficiency. They learned lessons of biology, the virtues of patience, and developed a sense of genuine pride at having accomplished something that once seemed far-fetched.
The garden in all its glory was introduced yesterday to the public and the media as part of a program to unveil PHS’s mobile gardening unit, The Green Machine. The vehicle—donated by Subaru, a longstanding supporter of PHS—will transport PHS staffers and consultants throughout the city where their skills and expertise will help transform other spaces like Chew.
As Mackin waited for the unveiling taking in the sights and sounds—squeals of delight, the buzz of bees—and noted that since it’s planting, not a single plant, bed, or patch of soil in the garden has fallen victim to vandalism. A yellow pepper hung from its stem untouched and admired for weeks before finally being picked by Roulan and the Chew kids.
The garden at Chew stands as a lush, green example of what makes Philadelphia neighborhoods thrive: collaborative efforts between residents and organizations that create beautiful spaces with the transformative power to inspire and sustain.
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