Emergent approaches to urban gardening

This chapter provides an overview of the latest trends of urban allotment gardens from a typological and spatial standpoint. It identifies urban dynamics behind the emergence of new ways to approach urban gardening, both as an activity and its spatial manifestations. The chapter presents a description of such emergent approaches, and discusses their cross-cutting and common characteristics, identifying the spatial implications for the urban context. Food from the Sky is a community-based organization which, in partnership with a supermarket in North London, constructed a permaculture community garden on the rooftop of the supermarket, selling produce on its shelves. Lack of availability of suitable urban land and difficulties in establishing a constructive dialogue with local authorities with regard to its provision can lead to the use of interstitial urban spaces for gardening practices. Looking at the guerrilla gardens, a strong parallel can be seen with the more institutionalized UAGs types in terms of occupation of underused land.