About the project

LAND SKY WATER was a six-session programme with the Essex Young Designers, who have been meeting at Beth Chatto’s Plants and Gardens to design and build three structures using repurposed and recycled materials from around the gardens. As part of the wider youth engagement programme for the upcoming Garden Community, the group has created a set of installations that will announce the arrival of the development, centring the regenerative design principles that are at its heart. 

One explores the relationship to LAND, including looking at biodiversity and how plant life can be integrated, building on Beth Chatto’s ethos of ‘right plant right place’. Another is connected to the SKY, exploring the local area’s relationship to light and the night sky. The third looks at the area’s relationship to WATER, including what this means in one of the UK’s driest counties.

LAND SKY WATER embodies the spirit and values of the future Garden Community which will be designed on the principles of a 21st century garden city, combining new housing with generous open spaces and parks. Crucially, it is being shaped by young people, through an extensive youth engagement programme that you can read more about here.