Our Yard at Clitterhouse Farm was established by four local residents with the aim of saving Clitterhouse Farm and restoring them for community use. Our campaign began back in 2014 when we started listening to the community and hearing about their aspirations for these buildings. Since then, we have door-knocked and listened to over seven hundred local residents capturing a clear vision for the future of the site. This deep listening process has helped us build a vision for a sustainable community enterprise and shown funders how the power of listening can engage a community to take action around common concerns and work together towards a collective vision.
Alongside a thriving community garden in 2018, Our Yard at Clitterhouse Farm successfully raised £100,000 in conjunction with the Mayor of London’s crowdfund for London which saw the farm receiving the highest number of pledges in any crowdfund for London campaign and the Mayor of London pledging an unprecedented £50,000 for. our community build. Our Yard received a 50K development grant through the GLA’s Good Growth Fund and in 2018 to build and design a full business plan for the heritage site. This report summarises the extensive continuation of community work that has been carried out over the years. Our Yard is run on volunteer power and illustrates the effectiveness of Community Organising.
Paulette Singer