Winter pickings are slim but there are a few things popping up at the Thomas Street Gardens P-Patch this winter
If you’re not already on the list, by the time you can join one, Seattle’s p-patch community garden program will probably be celebrating its 52nd or 53rd anniversary. But impatiently giving up on hope that your turn to be part of a public neighborhood garden will ever come is a Seattle rite of passage. The gardens, meanwhile, add beautiful pockets of growth and color around the city. And your countertop mushroom farm is pretty cool, anyhow.
2023 marks 50 years of the p-patch program and the City Council and Mayor Bruce Harrell have proclaimed it the Year of Community Gardening in Seattle:
The P-Patch Community Gardening Program was officially started in 1973, but the program grew out of a larger movement focused on growing food for community and those in need. The name “P-Patch” commemorates the Picardo family who operated a truck farm in the Wedgwood area in the early twentieth century. Darlyn Rundberg, a neighbor of the Picardos, was inspired to start a community garden as part of the first Earth Day celebration. She asked the family if she could use a corner of their property as a community garden to grow food for people affected by the economic downturn. They agreed and, during the first two years, Puget Consumers Co-op (now PCC Community Markets) managed the community garden.
The city says its P-Patch Community Gardening Program managed by the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods is “the largest municipally managed community gardening program west of New York.”
Seattle’s community gardeners grow food, flowers, and herbs on 15 acres of land across the city and provide stewardship for an additional 35 acres. All p-patch gardens are open to the public to enjoy and are utilized “as restorative spaces, learning and idea incubators, and venues for community gatherings.”
Unpaving Paradise from above (Image: Shawn Brinsfield/City of Seattle)
On Capitol Hill, there are six community gardens with another five within easy walking distance in the Central District.
Around the Hill, they range in size and activity. The Thomas Street Gardens, for example, hosts 28 plots across 3,200 square feet at 1010 E Thomas. A “three foot high curved aggregate wall, adding the dimensions of height and depth and creating an illusion of the site being larger” gives the Gardens “a feeling of being a neighborhood ‘pocket park’ that just happens to have vegetables growing in it,” the city says.
The tiny Pelican Tea Garden at 1909 E Roy, on the other hand, is barely 1,000 square feet and is run as a collective with no plots. But there are honeybees.
CAPITOL HILL’S P-PATCHES
Thomas Street Gardens (Image: City of Seattle)
- Unpaving Paradise is a 31-plot P-Patch community garden that was established on the site of a former parking lot. The garden was developed as a result of the efforts of the Capitol Hill Community Council and funding from the 2008 Parks & Green Space Levy. In the 2000s, Seattle Parks and Recreation purchased the land and the community saw an opportunity to create a garden for the many apartment dwellers in the area. In 2010, the community began transforming the parking lot into a garden and after several months of work, the Unpaving Paradise P-Patch was officially dedicated in December 2011. Today, visitors can enjoy the garden’s bountiful flowers and produce with a unique view of the Seattle skyline.
- Thomas Street Gardens P-Patch is a community garden at 1010 E Thomas. It was established in 1997 and covers an area of 3,200 sq. ft. with 28 plots and 2 ADA beds. The garden was designed by architect, landscape architect, and Master Gardener, Lyle Grant, and features a three-foot high curved aggregate wall that creates an illusion of the site being larger and provides a feeling of being a neighborhood pocket park. The main path is made of stone and accessible to all, while the tool shed is modern in design. The front gate and trellis are also well-designed to tie in with the neighboring houses. The garden includes herbaceous borders and perennial beds, and a rockery planted into the aggregate wall. There is also a wrought iron bench designed and made by Lambda House youth and artists from Pratt Institute. The wait time for a plot is 1-2 years.
- The Broadway Hill P-Patch is a community garden located in the Broadway Hill Park. It was established in 2015, with funding provided through the Parks & Green Space Levy and Parks Opportunity Fund. The garden comprises of 16 plots and is known for its beautiful park-like setting. Despite its relatively recent establishment, it has already become a popular destination for local gardeners, with a wait time of 2 or more years. Despite the lack of information about its size, the Broadway Hill P-Patch offers a lovely and serene environment for gardening and community building.
- The Howell Collective P-Patch is located at 1514 E Howell and was established in 2011. It is a unique type of community garden that operates as a “collective” with no individual plots. The 4,200 sq. ft. garden is maintained and harvested together by P-Patchers and is designed to support urban agriculture, increase public green space, and bring neighbors together in nature. The garden also features a Giving Garden and a water catchment system. The wait time to join the collective is 6-12 months.
- The Pelican Tea Garden is a communal garden established in 2001 and located at 1909 E Roy. It is a small garden of only 1,000 sq. ft. with a wait time of 1-2 years. It is tended by a dedicated group of gardeners and is known for its freshly-painted periwinkle-blue fences, cherry tree, and various crops. It is a peaceful oasis where neighborhood residents can contribute art, rock sculptures, or poetry, making it a popular spot for an afternoon break or evening stroll. The garden also features honeybees.
- The Republican P-Patch is located in the Miller Park neighborhood. Established in 1986, it features 23 plots and is 2,600 sq. ft. in size. With its 20 or so gardeners, this garden is a mix of novice and experienced cultivators. Some plots are outlined with blue glass bottles, while others have secret treasures hidden away. The garden is a proud and lively community, with fences bordered by flowers. The wait time for a plot is 1-2 years.
A Republican P-Patch on Capitol Hill? Yup (Image: Kathy Shannon/City of Seattle)
Joining the program is free but a high commitment effort with wait times that span years. You can learn more about the process — and community gardening opportunities to join in the meantime — here (PDF). Members of communities that are underserved by the program including Black or African American households, immigrant household, or low income households might also be prioritized.
Capitol Hill’s growing population of renters might be most interested in the program but younger, more mobile gardeners will need to stay on their toes and keep their registration for the program up to date.
“Plot openings typically occur between January and June. When a plot is available, you will be contacted by a member of the P-Patch team,” the city says. “However, it is possible that you may be contacted in the middle of summer or fall when a plot becomes available. We encourage you to take a plot when it is offered, but you can ask to stay on the list for the next opening. We periodically check in with those on the interest list to confirm interest, you must confirm your continued interest and, if necessary, update your information by the given deadline. If you don’t respond, you will be removed from the P-Patch interest list.”
Meanwhile, maintaining healthy, thriving growing spaces in the middle of the city sometimes require more than green thumbs. In 2022, the city granted $26,000 to build a new fence for the Howell Street Collective P-patch on the edge of Seven Hills Park to “help reduce litter and communicate the intentionality of the area as a space to grow produce while continuing to keep the garden open to the community at large.”.
You can learn more at seattle.gov.
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For anyone considering this, the waits for these P-Patches are actually many years longer than reported. Way back in 2018, I joined the waiting list for either Thomas St. Gardens or Unpaving Paradise. On the City of Seattle’s P-Patch dashboard site, my “seniority date” is in the summer of 2018. After 4.5 years, I’m still waiting.
Also, the dashboard doesn’t give any sign of the turnover rate or number of people ahead of you in the list, so you’ll have no idea where you are.
Maybe this will help someone else. If I’d known then that the wait would be this long, I’d have picked a less-popular site.
Thanks for sharing your experience and advice. Appreciate the insights
Yes, I have the impression that a 1 to 2 year wait is the average for all the P-patches, but the ones on Capitol Hill have much longer wait times. I waited to get into Republican P-patch for 4 years, and that was quite a while ago.
I signed up for the Fremont waitlists in December 2020. Still have not heard back.
Wish there were more, they seem like a great community resource and a good alternative to a small park. They definitely fall prey to pickers though. RIP anything you can eat without cooking.
But they could build low income housing on those sites.
Leave the P-patches alone! They are a very valuable community resource. We need more green spaces, not less.
But they are not going to build low income housing on those sites; they would be developed for mixed use, at best. Public green spaces are what make a city livable.
I remember when both the Harrison P-Patch, and the 11th/Republican park were houses. It is amazing to me that the city took those spaces over to make them public. Would not happen today and I’m so glad they are there.
Do you mean the Broadway Hill Park at Federal and Republican? I’ve lived here about a decade and it’s housed at least one or more tents during a majority of that time. I can’t help but wonder what might have been if that was space households (I could see 30+ on that space). I appreciate setting aside space, but we have Cal Anderson, Volunteer Park, Seattle University, and Interlaken Park within walking distance nearby. I find p-patches quite exclusionary and would love to see more community gardens or something like the Food Forest in Beacon Hill.
We have some in white center available!
Another option is to do your own raised bed in the planting strip between the sidewalk and street. It’s a simple online form, you just need to have permission from (or be) the property owner and submit a draft plan (think one page pen and paper rough sketch) that follows a few simple guidelines.
https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/permits-and-services/permits/planting-in-the-right-of-way
Also, if people are more interested in getting their hands dirty and gardening with like-minded people, there are plenty of urban farming organizations (Black Farmers Collective comes to mind, but there are many others) that have regular work parties and volunteer opportunities at their gardens/farms. You’re generally not growing your own food, but food that will be donated to community members through various means, but still get the enjoyment of seeing something grow and nourish life 👍
What’s going on with the old CHOP “community garden” in Cal Anderson?
The name I’ve heard is the BLM Memorial Gardens. Black Star Farms had been managing it last I heard, and still seems to be hosting events there giving out food, but haven’t posted work parties at these gardens in a few months.
https://instagram.com/blackstarfarmers