Page 18 - Landscape SA 104

NURSERY FEATURE
URBAN
OCTOPUS
GARDEN
Text and photos supplied by Henry
Mathys, Programme Manager, Social
Inclusion and Spacemaking, V & A
Waterfront
Originally a piece of lawn
within the V&A Water-
front in Cape Town, the
Octopus Garden is an on-
going urban food project,
the mandate of which is
to support sustainable
urban food programmes,
create jobs and improve
the aesthetics of the V&A’s
open spaces.
Late summer harvest
16 Landscape SA • Issue 104 2021
A typical Friday morning harvest
he garden is based on permaculture with Felix Holmes of Flat Rock Studio. Their
principles, and the freshly harvested brief was that they would have two years
Tproduce is sent to projects which to use the space, after which the garden
feed people living in poverty. These might have to be relocated, “just as an
include Ladles of Love, which provides octopus would move around a rockpool,
wholesome meals to people who have
lost their jobs, and The Homestead,
which assists homeless children with
their personal growth, development and
education into a future off the streets. To
date nearly seven tonnes of fresh produce
has been grown in the garden with the
assistance of a resident permacologist,
Mike Mberi.
The project was initiated after V&A staff
were polled on social matters. Their chief
concerns, it emerged, lie around skills,
enterprise development, waste reduction,
marine protection, gender-based violence
and food security. These became the
focus of the Waterfront’s Corporate Social
Investment (CSI) programme, known
as the V&A Waterfront Our Community
Programme. “The Octopus Garden aligns
on many levels with the Waterfront’s
shared value ecosystem,” says Henry
Mathys, Senior Manager for Social Impact
at the Waterfront.
Design aspects
The garden was designed by Ian Dommisse Disguising cabbages with interplanting to
of Dommisse Landscapes, in collaboration hide them from cabbage moths