Vegetable gardens in High Schools – Amiens > Vergers Urbains, Atelier l’Embellie, Epigénie 2020 – 2021

Vegetable gardens in High Schools – Amiens > Vergers Urbains, Atelier l’Embellie, Epigénie, 2020 – 2021

“Our proposal is collective, carried by the team of Vergers Urbains, supported by Atelier l’Embellie (Anaïs Jeunehomme) and Epigénie (Johann Laskowski). We have gathered a multidisciplinary team made up of landscapers, animators, carpenters, agronomists, architects, ecologists and town planners. Our team get a strong experience with the school world and is familiar with collaborative work, associating mediation and co-creation … We will be a source of proposals to discuss trails of (co)management, with the foreshadowing of productive and economically viable spaces and accompanied by professional market gardeners capable of generating production likely to supply canteens. The vegetable gardens will make it possible to place the process within a global ecosystem, addressing multiple environmental issues. Beyond food issues, it will question the management of waste (by composting the remains of the canteen in particular), water, biodiversity…
These sites are conducive to transmission, in continuity with the educational program. It will give rise to the creation of resource spaces likely to engage high schools in a process of transformation, towards an ecological and food transition, which will be based on the creation of a new, productive, interactive and educational landscape. It will integrate an immersive, initiatory, sensory and thematic journey, leading to the discovery of a diversity of cultures and nutritive techniques. The layout will be inspired by natural ecosystems, integrating different levels of human interactions. A gradual ecosystem, organized in layers, evolving from the forest universe to bio-intensive market gardening, including the establishment of a fruit forest, an orchard and a vegetable orchard. The route will be staged by woven structures and will lead to a bioclimatic greenhouse-nursery, passing through different thematic spaces. The greenhouse, zone 0 of a permaculture design, will house the student reception and workshops. The ethics and principles of permaculture will guide us : multifunctionality, integration of elements, valorisation of borders, support on local resources, regeneration / creation of fertile soil.
The process will count as much as the result. It will be participatory. All students will have the opportunity to contribute, according to their aspirations. A group of motivated referents will be formed… These students, once trained, will be able to pass on their knowledge. This initiation will take up and adapt the animation systems usually used to trigger collaborative processes and generate assimiliation of the project. The design will be based on different techniques defined with the students: brainstorming, model, drawings, in-situ staking. The realization will be based on the construction team of Vergers Urbains, experienced in the animation of specific workshops (weaving of living wicker, dry stone walls, raw earth, etc.)…We will connect with local resource players, depending on the site chosen, in order to facilitate project monitoring. These players will be likely to be involved from the early stages in collaboration with the team.”

Project by the team Vergers Ubrains accompanied by Atelier l’Embellie (Anaïs Jeunehomme) and Epigénie (Johann Laskowski)