Start your Halloween early, show your support for Elizabeth Street Garden and celebrate at our third annual Harvest Festival.
Third Annual Elizabeth Street Garden Harvest Festival —
Saturday, Oct. 24, Noon – 4:00 p.m. (Rain date: Sunday, Oct. 25)
Costumes encouraged!
Enjoy a day of FREE, fun activities for all ages, live music, and lite bites and refreshments donated by neighborhood businesses. Give back by bringing canned soups, vegetables and beans to benefit The Bowery Mission’s Thanksgiving Meal.
For Everyone
- Live Music performed by Jason Harrod & Friends, among others.
- Edible Garden Tour with herbalist Kirsten Tempel.
- Cooking Demonstration using the Garden’s harvest by PUBLIC’s chef de cuisine Alan Wise.
- Designing Greeting Cards with pressed leaves by Open Window.
- Social Media Sharing Station. Tag with #elizabethstreetgarden and tell the world why the Garden is important to you!
For Kids
- Ghastly Garden of Ghouls Halloween Party with Halloween art by McNally Jackson Books, featuring Argentine cartoonist and children’s books author Liniers.
- Pumpkin Decorating courtesy of The Montessori in SoHo.
- Little Scientists. Explore the Garden and dig in the dirt with Little Peep Prep.
- Face Painting by the Chinatown YMCA.
For Green Thumbs
- Planting Daffodil Bulbs courtesy of New Yorkers for Parks. No gardening skills required. Just the desire to get your hands in the dirt.
For Early Birds
- Vinyasa Yoga at 11 a.m.
Lite Bites and Refreshments Donated By
- A.B. Biagi
- Black Seed
- Cafe Habana
- Café’tal Social Club
- Little Rascal
- Lovely Day
- Pomodoro Pizza
- Prince Street Pizza
- PUBLIC
- Rubirosa Ristorante
- Tacombi
This FREE event is open to the public. For updated activity and event times and details, visit the Garden calendar.
The Harvest Festival is the culmination of Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden’s Edible Garden Lab neighborhood-led initiative, which began in spring to engage both children and adults with the Garden as a living laboratory and has been funded in part by a generous grant from Citizens Committee for New York City.
Instructor Wenji Zou helps you stimulate the end points of the body’s energy pathways, develop a keener sense of awareness and clear your head.
Open to the public and FREE.
Instructors from our neighborhood studios will help you get your stretch on. Please bring your own mat.
Open to the public and FREE.
October Volunteer Instructors:
Oct. 4 — TBA
Oct. 11 — Suzanne Monto
Oct. 18 — Jason Ostrander
Oct. 25 — TBA
Garden volunteer Alan Young and his 2-year-old son Callum entertain kids with their favorite stories.
Open to all children under age 5. FREE.
Open to the public and FREE.
Garden volunteer Alan Young and his 2-year-old son Callum entertain kids with their favorite stories.
Open to all children under age 5. FREE.
Help Us Begin Planning for Next Year
Monthly Garden Meeting — Sunday, Nov. 8, Noon – 1 p.m.
To keep the Garden open year round for our community to enjoy, Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden needs your expertise in:
- Urban gardening, as we expand this season’s edible plantings;
- Community organizing and volunteer coordination;
- Educational, cultural and wellness programming;
- Grant writing and fundraising; and
- Communications, both digital/social and traditional.
If you are interested in volunteering and cannot attend this meeting, email [email protected].
Open to the public and FREE.
Garden volunteer Alan Young and his 2-year-old son Callum entertain kids with their favorite stories.
Open to all children under age 5. FREE.
Spend a fall morning outdoors with neighbors and help prepare the Garden for winter. Following coffee and bagels, we will rake leaves, plant spring-flowering bulbs and mulch. No experience necessary. Both adults and kids are welcome. Open to the public and FREE.
The Daffodil Project was founded in 2001 as a living memorial to Sept. 11. With nearly 5 million free bulbs planted citywide by New Yorkers, it is one of the largest volunteer efforts in the city’s history.
Garden volunteer Alan Young and his 2-year-old son Callum entertain kids with their favorite stories.
Open to all children under age 5. FREE.
Open to the public. FREE.
Show New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) that our local community favors saving Elizabeth Street Garden and opposes any development plans!
Let’s make our voices heard:
1. Attend Community Board 2′s Working Group on Affordable Housing Development Meeting — Wednesday, Jan. 20, 6:30 p.m.
Location: Scholastic Auditorium
557 Broadway (between Prince and Spring streets)
Arrive before 6:30 p.m. and WEAR GREEN. Download and print a Save Our Garden sign or, better yet, make one of your own. Garden volunteers will distribute Save Our Garden stickers.
2. Let us know if you plan to attend the hearing. RSVP here.
3. Share this message with your neighbors and friends, especially those who live in the neighborhood, via email or social media.
Meeting Details
New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) will present an “intended process and timeline for a Request for Proposals (RFP) for an affordable housing development at Elizabeth Street Garden.” This RFP process would invite developers to submit proposals for a construction project that would destroy the Garden.
Q&A will immediately follow, first by Community Board 2 (CB 2) members and then by the public. During Q&A, Garden supporters may ask how HPD’s plan to develop the Garden takes into account the:
- Lack of green park space in CB 2;
- Heavy use of the Garden by local residents including neighborhood seniors and children;
- Needs of the hundreds of residents at 21 Spring St.;
- Strong support from the local community for preserving the Garden as a park;
- An alternative to build affordable housing at Hudson and Clarkson streets;
- How development that includes ground-floor retail will impact local small businesses; and
- Additional questions raised by HPD’s presentation.
Following Q&A, public comments will be welcome.
The Scholastic auditorium seats 271, so there will be plenty of room for Garden supporters! RSVP here.
Why YOUR Attendance Makes a Difference
By attending the Jan. 20 meeting, you have the opportunity to show HPD, our elected officials and community leaders that our local neighborhood and business community are committed to saving Elizabeth Street Garden. RSVP here.
In September, Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden supporters wrote more than 1,500 letters in favor of saving the Garden and in opposition to a Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) grant to HPD for an affordable housing project that would destroy the Garden.
Additionally, more than 250 supporters attended (or tried to attend) the LMDC hearing. Supporters filled the main hearing room, two overflow rooms and an outside terrace. Some were never even able to enter the building due to overwhelming attendance, but each and every one of us was counted!
To date, LMDC has not yet made a decision on grant recipients, but our overwhelming support showed that building on Elizabeth Street Garden does not demonstrate “a high level of community interest and support,” a primary criterion for the grant.
As the working group will meet in executive session, the public will have the opportunity to attend and listen.
Open to the public and FREE.
Open to the public and FREE!
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Join over a thousand community gardeners and greening professionals from all over New York City for a day of learning, sharing, networking, and greening inspiration at the 32nd Annual GreenThumb GrowTogether!
This year’s conference features exciting new workshops and returning favorites, including many hands-on and youth-focused workshops, for gardeners of all ages.
It feels like spring. Come outside and play in the dirt. Join Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden for bagels & spreads and coffee and help get the Garden ready for the season. We’ll clean, cut back, dig and divide. BYOPruners, if you have them.
No gardening experience required, just come ready to help. Everyone is welcome.
Open to the public and FREE.
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Join Us As Volunteers Plan 2016 Programming & Social Events
We will focus this month on 2016 programming. If you or your local community organization are interested in providing free, public programming or hosting a special event or performance in the Garden, please complete this event form by March 22.
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Community Gardening, weekly
Open to the public and FREE.
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].
Community Gardening, weekly
Open to the public and FREE.
Volunteers keep the Garden open for our community. The more volunteers there are, the more hours the Garden can be open. Volunteering is flexible and simply involves welcoming visitors for just ONE hour at a time. Some volunteers volunteer each week, and other less frequently. Become a volunteer.
If you would like to volunteer but cannot make this time, please email [email protected].