The Brixton Garden Party

At all the meetings so far, the idea of holding a street party has come up It seems like a great way to get people engaged in the project and for people locally to get to know each other a bit better. So we got together to plan and this is what we came up with...

The Brixton Garden Party :  Sunday 18^th September from 4pm, Fairmount Road

The idea is for people to get together, maybe have a community barbeque and for as many households as possibl to bring stuff along to eat and share. We want lots of stuff for children to do, and the chance for people to hear about the project, share their ideas and views and get involved in a community design process so that their input can feed directly into the project.

It would be fantastic if the party itself demonstrated how much we can achieve together as a community  - and most importantly it will be a chance to have a really good party. A lot of people talked about events for the Big Lunch - we have missed this year's date, but this is our chance to do something similar.

So where to start ?

First we need 10-12 people to volunteer to leaflet, knock on doors, distribute info and gather emails from residents in Fairmount Road, Beechdale Road and Raleigh Gardens - the three roads adjacent to the site. We have 6 volunteers already, so another 6 means that we would only need to knock on about 10 doors each and it shouldn't take more than 45 minutes. We plan to do this as a group or in pairs with people starting closest to their own home addresses early evening in the week of 15th August . Please email thegardenbixton@gmail.com if you can help out.

We hope that this will get even more people interested, and it would be good to get as many people as possible along to a party planning meeting during that week as well - more details to follow.

We also thought we could ask some local businesses to make a donation in cash or kind or offer support on the day and we can think more about how we do that when we meet , but if anyone has any contacts with local businesses please do give me a shout. Please get in touch if you have any contacts with schools in the area who might want to get involved by supplying a band or doing a show.

We brainstormed a list of ideas about things we would need for the party - some people had done this before and it was great to hear that you don't need much to have a good street party, even in bad weather (although not much can be done if it totally tips with rain). 

We have probably forgotten things from this list so please do add ideas of what would make a good party. Most importantly, please let me know if you own or can get hold of any of these items as we don't have any budget for this party so we are hoping that between the three streets we can find everything we need.

Things we need:

Tarpaulins

A few gazebos or a small marquee

Folding tables and chairs

Face painting, chalk for chalk drawing on the pavements, ping pong or any other games that can be played in large groups

Electricity cables

Sound system and DJ

A small stage?
A big barbeque or lots of little barbeques

And to let people know about the project...

3 display boards to contain information about the project 

Photos and information about places that inspire us

A site model

Plasticine and other materials to model ideas for the site

Cameras/video cameras

I'll post a bit later with a list of things that need doing on the day...meanwhile, happy party planning!