Battle and Caversham Community Garden

Before this land became a community garden, it served as the site of a sprawling brickworks that operated throughout the middle of the nineteenth century. The intense heat of the kilns and the constant extraction of clay fundamentally altered the soil composition here, leaving behind layers of subterranean debris that volunteers still occasionally unearth while planting today. This industrial past explains the distinct drainage patterns of the current garden, as the compacted earth from the former factory foundation creates unique microclimates for different plant beds.