Volunteer at Chiswick House & Gardens to Mark the Coronation
The Big Help Out is a day for you to get involved
Spring cleaning the House is one option on the day. Picture: Chiswick House & Gardens Trust/ Conor Bakhuizen
April 15, 2023
The Big Help Out is taking place on Monday 8 May at Chiswick House & Gardens.
The Trust that runs the estate is one of thousands of organisations across the UK offering volunteering opportunities as part of the celebrations for the coronation.
The objective of The Big Help Out is to raise awareness of volunteering and provide opportunities for people to make a difference in their local community.
There are already 180 people volunteering at Chiswick House and they provide invaluable backing in addition to that provided by funders, Members and Patrons. There will be a range of volunteering activities offered at Chiswick House on the day to give more people a chance to get involved.
You can join the gardening team for a couple of hours, working to re-introduce biodiversity to woodland areas by weeding invasive species and developing habitat areas as well as re-locating woody material, adding to habitat piles and clearing open ground. This takes place between 10.30am and 12.30am and is open to anyone aged 17 or over or children over 12 accompanied by a parent or guardian. To join come to the Park Road Gate.
If you prefer you can help spring clean the Grade-I listed Neo-Palladian villa. Choose between gently dusting the interior using conservator-approved brushes and cloths or cleaning the stonework on the front and back exterior stairways. Come to the house at 11am for an hour and a half’s cleaning. This is open to anyone aged 17 or over or children over 12 accompanied by a parent or guardian.
You can join the Trust's gardening team on the day. Picture: Chiswick House & Gardens Trust/ Chris Greer
From noon there will be a Family Gardening Challenge in which you can bring the whole family to join a ‘Speed Weeding’ event. This starts at noon and continues until 12.30pm. Meet at the Park Road Gate. All ages are welcome at this event.
Participation is free but volunteers are required to register in advance.
After their hard work, Big Help volunteers are welcome to spend the day enjoying the free Gardens. The Café will be open all day and at 1pm, the Chiswick House Dog Show Doggie Dash will be taking place on the Western Lawn. The Kitchen Garden will also be open 11am-4pm with free entry for Members.
Kitchen Garden volunteers. Picture: Chiswick House & Gardens Trust/ Sasha Gorb
Rosie Fyles, Head of Gardens at Chiswick House & Gardens Trust, said, “Volunteering is a brilliant way to get out and about, meet like-minded people and contribute to making your local neighbourhood a bit better. I started out as a volunteer and my experience of volunteering was life changing. We can’t promise that on 8 May, but we can promise fresh air, good conversation and feeling like you’ve helped and achieved something.”
Value Reading Articles Like This? Help Us Produce More This site remains committed to providing local community news and public interest journalism. Articles such as the one above are integral to what we do. We aim to feature as much as possible on local societies, charities based in the area, fundraising efforts by residents, community-based initiatives and even helping people find missing pets. We’ve always done that and won’t be changing, in fact we’d like to do more. However, the readership that these stories generates is often below that needed to cover the cost of producing them. Our financial resources are limited and the local media environment is intensely competitive so there is a constraint on what we can do. We are therefore asking our readers to consider offering financial support to these efforts. Any money given will help support community and public interest news and the expansion of our coverage in this area. A suggested monthly payment is £8 but we would be grateful for any amount for instance if you think this site offers the equivalent value of a subscription to a daily printed newspaper you may wish to consider £20 per month. If neither of these amounts is suitable for you then contact info@neighbournet.com and we can set up an alternative. All payments are made through a secure web site. One-off donations are also appreciated. Choose The Amount You Wish To Contribute. If you do support us in this way we’d be interested to hear what kind of articles you would like to see more of on the site – send your suggestions to the editor. For businesses we offer the chance to be a corporate sponsor of community content on the site. For £30 plus VAT per month you will be the designated sponsor of at least one article a month with your logo appearing if supplied. If there is a specific community group or initiative you’d like to support we can make sure your sponsorship is featured on related content for a one off payment of £50 plus VAT. All payments are made through a secure web site. |
