Get to Gardening
The Community Gardens Coordinator works with community to maintain The Wark St. Commons, The People’s Apothecary and The Quadra Village Allotment Gardens. We also support and collaborate with other gardening, food-security, and cultural initiatives and organizations in the Quadra-Hillside neighbourhood.
The gardens provide space for folks to gather, observe, participate in and learn about organic and permaculture gardening with edible, medicinal, pollinator, native and Indigenous plants. Through gardening we find opportunities for community-building, co-creating a sense of place, building skills and resilience, reconnecting with nature in the urban environment, and providing native pollinator habitat. Our aim is to teach and learn from our community of gardeners and want-to-be-gardeners in our neighbourhood.
Get Involved!
We are always looking to grow and welcome new volunteers with all levels of skills, abilities and backgrounds. Work on a friendly team or work on a solo project. There are opportunities take on a regularly scheduled garden task, such as weeding, pruning, seed-saving or general clean-up around the Quadra Village Community Centre. Fill out an application by clicking the button below:
Reach out to Garden Coordinator Jarret: gardens@quadravillagecc.com for more information
The Quadra Village Allotment Gardens
The allotment gardens provide individual garden plots that are maintained and harvested by individual gardeners. There are three sized beds available at the following rates*:
Family: $60/year
Single: $40/year
Accessible: $20/year
*A discount will be provided with proof of income assistance
Please note: all of the beds are now taken. Our Waitlist is now full. Please check back for updates.
For more information email gardens@quadravillagecc.com
The Wark Street Commons
Wark Street Commons is a mainstay of the Quadra Village community on the corner of Kings Rd and Wark St., acting both as a welcoming community gathering space and ecological refuge for the past 15 years. The Commons was established with help from the Hillside Urban Farmers For Sustainability (HUFFS) network. The Commons offers an ever-shifting diversity of edible, medicinal, ornamental, native and pollinator plants that are maintained by community volunteers and can be harvested by all.
The People’s Apothecary
The People’s Apothecary is a herbal commons; it is a living, changing, alternative to the dominant ways our lives are organized in a colonial state capitalist society. The Garden aims to create, strengthen and connect alternatives to the exploitative systems where we can remember how our ancestors would have lived: self-reliance, relationships with nature, and community resilience through healing herbs, gardening, and sharing space together.
This project was facilitated by the Green Tongue Collective on the grounds of what is now the former Vancouver Island School of Art building at 2549 Quadra St. This project relies on ongoing community mobilization for ongoing maintenance and development. The garden has hosted a diverse series of workshops, skill-shares and learning opportunities. All herbs grown in the space are available to use by members of the community.
The project is community-based and includes work parties, social events, skill-shares and other happenings exploring permaculture and herbalism as practical skills, artistic expressions and methods of alternative community building.
Visit Our Gardens
Wark Street Commons
2599 Wark Street
Wark Street Park, between Bay and Kings in Quadra Village
The People’s Apothecary
2549 Quadra Street
Vancouver Island School of Art,
Quadra Village Allotment Gardens
955 Hillside Ave
Around the back of the Summit Facility
We thank the City of Victoria for funding the Community Gardens Programs.
