Every week, twice a week, a group of local volunteers heads out into Manor Park to help keep it looking great.
Led by Bryn Jones, this valiant team, are in the park come rain or shine.
Why does the park look so clean these days? You can thank our Wombles. With their litter-pickers in hand they scour the park for those items of rubbish people can’t be bothered to put in a bin or take home.
Their work doesn’t stop at litter-picking. No. They cut back bramble, plant bulbs and hedging, look after the flower-beds by the edge of the car park, top up the bird-feeders, maintain informal paths and lots more. They also act as an important set of ears and eyes in the park. Reporting issues as they arise. They even keep the Plough Green space litter free, often pulling rubbish out of the pond.
A big thanks goes to Bryn, Ian, Peter, Malcolm, Betty, Nick and Don.
This group is run by Friends of Manor Park. If you’d like to get involved with our work, please drop us a line at team@ourmanorpark.org.uk
It’s your park, never forget that. The more the community gets involved the better it can be.
This year we wanted to add a little bit extra to our community Christmas celebrations at Plough Green, Old Malden. We initially thought of adding ‘a few more stalls’, but what started there, grew into something much larger…
…’A few more stalls’ turned into a Christmas gift market. We then decided that we needed a Santa’s Grotto. The music tent was doubled in size, and we added three extra acts, supported by a beefy sound system. And with all that going on, we would need much more food and drink. We sourced a wide range of suppliers.
We set-up the Christmas tree the day before the event. A small team of regulars came out and decorated it in the morning. In the afternoon, the Fangorn Landscapes team came out to install the white picket fencing, which they do every year.
We got onto site early on Sunday morning to start the set-up for the event. Gazebos needed putting up and our lighting and cabling needed to be installed. Fortunately this year, we’d recruited local electricians, Neal Wadsworth Electrical, to support the event. They provided their service entirely for free. The weather took a turn for the worse, with constant rain all morning, By lunchtime we were ready and the skies had cleared.
Our gift market comprised of 15 vendors, who were selling gifts ranging from locally sourced honey to locally brewed beer, and much more in between.
Our music tent, which Fangorn Landscapes had sponsored, hosted: the Malden Manor Church Choir; musical acts from Coombe Boys School; duo, Two Infinity; and Vibrant Ukes.
Food and drink was provided by Hooky Street, Miller & Carter, a crepe van, and Seoul Food (Korean Food stall). We sold (lots of) mulled wine, plus treats from the Plough Bakery, from the Community Tent.
Santa’s Grotto was a big hit. It was sponsored and looked after by the team from Visiting Angels North Surrey. Throughout the afternoon over 150 children were able to meet Father Christmas.
The day finished off with the switching on of the lights. I introduced our special guest, Henry Riley, who we’d invited to switch-on the tree lights. Henry is a former pupil of Richard Challoner, and rising star at LBC. We wanted to celebrate local success.
The green was packed with local residents as the lights were switched on, and many joined in with our festive sing-along led by the Ukele band – the Vibrant Ukes.
All too soon the event was over, and we were packing away. We were fortunate that so many people stuck around to help break-down the gazebos and the lighting.
A massive thank-you to all our volunteers who worked tirelessly to help make the event a great success. A special mention to our event director, Nausheen Arnold.
We were raising money for Kingston Hospital and our beloved, Manor Park.If you’d like to support our work in anyway, please do drop us a line at team@ourmanorpark.org.uk
For our second volunteer morning of the Autumn, we had a fantastic turnout – 40 plus people, young and old, got stuck into a variety of tasks around the park. We were over the moon to welcome back some of our Saturday morning regulars and really pleased to see so many new faces.
We cleared paths of overgrowth, cut-back bramble, and planted daffodils, tulips and wild-flowers. Several bags of litter were gathered from all round the park. (This is the type of litter that would never get retrieved by the council’s contractor.) At one stage we had so many people active around the park, that we ran short of tools.
Our mid-morning refreshment break is always a good opportunity to catch up with our regular helpers and chat with our new volunteers. These are always very social occasions.
It was a very successful event. I hope everyone involved will get a great deal of satisfaction seeing all the new flowers appearing in spring, and knowing that they’ve played their part keeping the park in good condition.
This was out last volunteer session of 2024. Keep your eye out on our events page for the next session. If you’d like to speak with us directly, please send an email to team@ourmanorpark.org.uk
