Good to Grow 2023

Good to Grow Day 2023: Register your London garden

We hope you can join the national day of edible action: Friday 21 to Monday 24 April! Register your garden now for #GoodToGrow2023 

Registration for this year's Good to Grow weekend of action is open. From the end of February, you'll be able to access the publicity and resource pack on your Good to Grow member dashboard, to support your gardens celebrate community food growing this April. 

Register for #GoodtoGrow2023

Not already a member of Capital Growth?

No problem! Membership is free and the form takes about 5 minutes. Anyone in London growing food in at least one square metre or more is eligible to join. Read more about the benefits.

Become a Capital Growth member

Join our online launch event for #GoodtoGrow2023

We hope you can join our Growing Food for Resilience webinar on 6 March to help us launch this year's Good to Grow. We'll be exploring community gardens in the cost of living crisis.

Book your place on our launch webinar

Practical ways to get involved with #GoodtoGrow2023

Good to Grow 2023 is a weekend of celebration for community gardens and growing networks to kick off the growing season. Typically, new and old volunteers and community members join forces to prepare beds, build structures, sow seeds and help with all the important jobs that need to be done to start the new season. It’s an opportunity to meet new people, get your hands dirty and support and enjoy valuable community spaces.

I would like to join in or volunteer at Good to Grow 2023

Gardens and growing spaces across the UK will start populating the Good to Grow map with their planned activities from mid February so check the Good to Grow map. Alternatively, get directly in touch with your nearest garden to express your interest. 

The history

The Big Dig Day started as an event run by Capital Growth in 2012 to engage volunteers in local food growing projects. Funding was also received to roll this out across the UK , recruiting 7,500 new volunteers to take part in community gardening. These local networks continue to recruit and engage volunteers locally.

In 2019 the Big Dig Day took place on Saturday the 27th of April. The day went national with over 100 gardens participating from across the UK.  People could use our interactive map to find a garden to volunteer with for the Big Dig day. Activities, hours and locations varied so that volunteers could find the right garden for them.

Since the Big Dig was first launched in 2012, a growing number of gardens have been adopting a 'no dig' approach to food growing and to reflect that we surveyed our members to find a new name that was more inclusive and representative of our network. After a great debate and lots of ideas, Good to Grow was voted in as the overwhelming favourite:

"Good to Grow is far more all encompassing in my opinion, great name!"

"Big Dig is just not appropriate to our project which is run on organic and no dig principles."

"Good to know, it might be - Good to Grow!"

"Good to Grow seems to me more inclusive"