Meet the millennial gardeners who bloomed during lockdown
When does adulthood begin? Is it your 18th or 21st birthday, or when you move out, start a career, get married or have children? I’m not sure what my marker is, but, at 28, I know I’m still some way off.
During the lockdown, however, I came the closest I have yet come to feeling like an adult. Why? I started looking after plants.
There have long been pot plants on our balcony, but this year I took up the protectoral mantle. In April, I bartered with neighbours for the El Dorado of compost, emptied old pots, resurrected winter-beaten perennials, carefully germinated (often unsuccessfully) tomatoes, chillies and peas, and watched (some of) them grow. I regularly checked the weather forecast before bed, surely a sign of early-onset middle age.
It seems I’m not alone. Interest in gardening has spiked among people in their twenties and early thirties since the UK was plunged into hibernation. For months, many were confined to their houses, with outdoor activity limited.
Those working from home suddenly had time to kill, conveniently coinciding with spring. People lucky enough to have gardens spent more time in them; others were drawn to balconies or indoor plants.
Research by ao.com has found that 66 per cent of millennials had more time to garden during the lockdown. According to the Royal Horticultural Society, visits to its website are up 533 per cent year-on-year among 18-24 year-olds; for the 25-34 category, clicks rose by 123 per cent. Its virtual Chelsea Flower Show received 2.1 million visitors; 28 per cent were under 35. Conversely, the charity estimates that only one per cent of visitors to last year’s regular event were aged 16-24, rising to six per cent for 25-34.
The ao.com poll says 62 per cent of lockdown gardeners found it vital for their well-being. For the RHS’s director of science, Professor Alistair Griffiths, this isn’t surprising. “There’s a lot of evidence around mental health and gardening. There’s a number of things it ties into. It provides an element of control, it helps restore the mind and there’s the physical exercise aspect.”
Climate change, too, is a growing worry. Far from a distant concern, Griffiths says we are beginning to feel its immediacy, with young people at the forefront. “More and more people, particularly younger people, are seeing how it’s affecting them right now,” he observes, pointing to recent events such as the Chobham Common fire.
Griffiths describes growing plants as “green infrastructure”, in the same vein as solar panels, and says that this gives individual gardeners a sense of control. “It’s not a silver bullet by any means,” Griffiths points out, but every little helps.
Some have turned their newfound passion into a career. Ollie Saunders is helping to launch the Chiswick Flower Market, which kicked off earlier this month, and is surprised by the number of young people opening stalls.
Many have switched careers, such as a lawyer now selling houseplants. “Obviously, there’s environmental awareness,” Saunders explains. He also thinks Covid-19 accelerated people’s plans – they may have been looking for an excuse; now, with lost jobs or commuting less appealing, is the time to turn them into reality.
Stories of millennials and their cacti have circulated for years. Yet, lockdown has encouraged many twentysomethings to fully immerse themselves in nature.
As for me, I’m still monitoring my plants every day and reaping the minimal, yet no less satisfying, gastronomical rewards.
Anya Visegorodceva
“ It’s helped my mental health. In lockdown, when we couldn’t go anywhere, allotments were on the go-to list”
When Anya Visegorodceva and her boyfriend moved to Wivenhoe, Essex, they received several plants as house-warming gifts, such as lilies and jasmines.
Within weeks, though, the plants died. “I didn’t know how to look after them, and I was too busy with other stuff,” admits Visegorodceva, who works at the University of Essex.
Nevertheless, three years ago, she signed up for a local allotment plot, forgot about it, and, a few weeks into the lockdown, was given one. Never previously a gardener, the keen cook wanted to grow her own produce. Now working from home, she had time to kill.
“I had the choice of two plots, and I picked the smaller one, which was in a far better condition,” Visegorodceva explains.
She quickly set about planting rare varieties of potatoes, strawberries, beetroot, radishes, beans, gooseberries, cucumbers, tomatoes and more.
Friends have been a vital source of information and support, sending tips or books. Connecting with other like-minded individuals on social media has helped, too. Her boyfriend has been “maybe four times”, but Visegorodceva visits every morning before work.
“It’s helped my mental health. In lockdown, when we couldn’t go anywhere, allotments were on the go-to list. Every morning I could get out of the house, water and weed the plants, and clear my head.”
The first winter is always a test, but Visegorodceva, 29, is determined to see it through, experimenting with seasonal plants like cabbages, purple-sprouting broccoli and garlic. “It’s rewarding and exciting. It might be a placebo, but eating your own stuff tastes so much better.”
Miranda Larbi
“There’s nothing like growing your own stuff and cooking a meal with it to really appreciate the achievements”
During the lockdown journalist Miranda Larbi, 30, found herself living with her parents in east London for the first time in years. At her flat, there was no outdoor space, but now Larbi had a garden.
“I’ve always been interested in gardening,” says Larbi, who, as a child, helped her grandfather propagate geraniums in North Yorkshire.
Her parents are keen gardeners, too, and Larbi began to help out. Soon, her father suggested they transform an unloved plot by a nearby church. “We put in manure, pellets, wood chips, the whole shebang,” says Larbi. “We turned over the soil, weeded, and planted all sorts of colourful plants.” So successful was the transformation that a parishioner has asked the father and daughter team to work on their garden as well.
The family garden is geared towards edible plants. “We’re all avid vegetable growers. There are tomatillos, tomatoes, peppers, chillies, cucumbers.” Larbi made pasta sauce from the tomatoes she describes as “incomparable” to bland supermarket options.
“There’s nothing like growing your own stuff and cooking a meal with it to really appreciate the achievements.”
For Larbi, gardening “is a very calming process, there’s something very nice about nurturing something, it teaches you to slow down. You can’t outrun plants, they’ll grow when they’re ready.” It also enabled her to connect with her father “in a very relaxed environment.”
Despite being an “outlier”, Larbi thinks interest is growing among her peers. She is helping her boyfriend turn his garden into “something more cared-for”.
“Over the lockdown, people have become more aware of what green space means to us; you have to lose it to really appreciate it. Home is now a sanctuary.”
Now back at her flat, Larbi has several houseplants. There are spider and snake plants, mother-in-law’s tongues and a cactus.
“I entertain hopes that one day I’ll own some form of property, in which case, I would love to have my own garden. Until then, I’ll keep turning my room into some sort of weird greenhouse.”
Nick Kroll
“It’s almost been meditative. Some of the tasks are quite menial, they don’t require a lot of thought”
As a 14-year-old – rarely for that age – Nick Kroll was a keen gardener. Starting with plug plants, he quickly developed a passion for growing his own vegetables.
Regular pursuits then got in the way: A-levels, university, living in flats without gardens. That was until the lockdown.
Now 26, Kroll returned to his parents’ home in Oxfordshire last year, but it was only when the Covid-19 pandemic hit, and he was ordered to work from home (Kroll is a meteorologist), that the bug was reignited.
Despite his parents not being particularly green-fingered, Kroll decided to resurrect his old vegetable patch.
Edible plants are the focus: courgettes, artichokes, aubergines. Kroll mostly uses YouTube videos and an old copy of Carol Klein’s Grow Your Own Veg for technical support, and there have been both failures and successes. The artichokes struggled, but the aubergines are flourishing.
“I’m most interested in the aubergines, they’re tricky to grow in the UK,” Kroll explains. “As a Mediterranean fruit, they need a lot of heat and sun. “We’ve had that in abundance this year, and they’ve done really well. I’m going to harvest my first ones this week.”
Kroll sowed 14 aubergine plants, and says: “there’s way too many to look after, we’ll be eating a lot of aubergine curry!” There’s also been a glut of courgettes, and, on a recent visit to London, he handed some to each of his friends.
Gardening isn’t a common pursuit among his peers, but they are intrigued. “I think they find it quite endearing, quite cute,” says Kroll.
“What I like about gardening is that it’s a project, with different stages,” Kroll explains. “First, the seeds germinate, and it’s a bit of a challenge. Then you watch them grow and develop and get to eat the final product. I like the opportunity to be outside.”
Kroll enjoys the solitude of tending to the vegetable patch. “It’s almost been meditative. Some of the tasks are quite menial, they don’t require a lot of thought. There’s something quite therapeutic about that.”
Though Kroll is moving out soon, his new house has a garden and greenhouse. “A proper glass one. I’m going up in the world!”
