Berliner Allmende-Kontor

a new project in berlin

severin halder mounting the banner

I started gardening at 14, but of course I am not a "real" gardener. I have sudied biology and my thesis on urban agriculture in Rio de Janeiro where I was working with an Ong, however gardening is just one side for me. The social side is more important. Unfortunately we have not people with immigrant backgrounds that joined the project yet, but we have just started. We have to manage to involve people of the sorrounding areas. There are a lot of them from Turkey, Eastern Europe or Arabian countries that have a great knowledge about gardening and for sure had a garden in their Romenia, Anatolia or wherever. They grew up in the countryside and they are going to bring their knowledge in their graves. Of course it happens that you are closer to the people that mirror you, but we have to force ourselves to be more in tough with the others.

Severin Halder

the first plants planted

mila interviewing kristin radix

Plants from the south need more heat and sun. Here in Gemany, for instance, if you want to grow courgettes you have to plant them at home, but you need a good exposition. You have to plant them indoor around february and you can bring them out on april. Salad, onions and potatoes are robust, so you can plant them outdoor when you wish, end of march, april, may. Just the experience let you know when they are ready, for this reason elders have much more knowledge than youngers as they have benn in touch with the ecosystem longer.

carrying tools for gardening

Together with other 20 people, I am in the  organization of Allmende-Kontor, then there are almost other 20 people who help us and other 100 who are interested in and signed to join our meetings. We have just started but we have a contract for 3 years and we got 5000 mq2, so it is a very long and big process... and the starting is quite difficult as we have to  carry everything: soil, wood, boxes and cannot leave anything in the night for the vandalism.

Kristin Radix

severin pointing the first pees

malte zacharias

These are cauliflowers even if they have been just seeded and you cannot see them. For these reason we put these little sticks, to have an orientation and understand where the plants will grow. Inside the soil you always have a lot of different kinds of seeds, so you have to know which plants support and get rid of the weeds.
The canvas instead  - that has to be putted all inside the case - is to avoid the soil going out, as soil is so expensive and we already have to pay a rent for this area (1 euro for 1 meter, so 5000 euro for year), so we really cannot waste it.

Severin Halder

on the right, Elisabeth Meyer-Renschausen

the soil

I like gardening because everyone can learn just thanks to the experience. Nowadays all of us have to be experts in everything before doing it. But it is not true. You can learn just trying and experimenting and it is easy. In one day you can learn how to repair you bike, for istance. So you can be indipendent for food and transport and it is a lot! You feel so powerfull.

tempelhof

Gardening to me is mostly pushing garden movements. I wish to promote social issues through gardening. Social and political. We have to be coinscious of what we eat and need. We import so much even if it is possible that you grow your own things. This kind of lifestyle is not working. It is just for few people at the highest prices. And what you plant taste so different, even from organic food. I do not care about labeling (organic or not) but I make difference between good quality and not. I think that Italian granmothers going to the markets are conscious of which is a tasty tomato and which not. In Germany we cannot recognize it anymore. Going to the markets in Berlin is bohemian and expensive.

Severin Halder 

http://www.tempelhoferfreiheit.de/mitgestalten/pionierfelder/oderstrasse/ 

Prinzessinnengarten

Other students and I with my family opened this place in July 2009. I wanted to become a father and have a job where I had not to work too much and could bring my kids with me. So, after living few years in Cuba, that has a very intense model of urban agricolture, I tried to do quite the same in Berlin. We cultivate all the different kind of vegetables you find in the supermarkets, but we use organic seeds to show our children how they grow and how better they are. Then we try to have a huge variety of kind for each vegetable. So we have 15 kinds of potatoes, 20 different kinds of tomatoes, 7 different kinds of carrots, 25 different kinds of ments, and some exotic things like 6 cm long beans from Africa. Some of the old women got cultural connections growing vegetables when they where young in Russia or Turkey or somewhere else. They have brought seeds or even plants with them from there, which they knew from their past, and which they wanted to have here as kind of piece of home. Many people have Turkish, Danish, French, American, English, Palestinian, Arabic, Indian, Swedish or Iraq ancestors. We have a very open system, so you do not have to become a member to partecipate.

Robert Shaw, British-German

In Germany we are not aloud to cultivate and sell herbs for medical purpose, so we do not cultivate any kind of these but we have got some things which are more for health. If you got a cough you can take a thyme tea or we have healing plants like comfrey.

Robert Shaw, English-German

Indigenuous people use some bushes for their health, but I do not know them. The same for our Chineses immigrants that have many traditional medicines using plants. However when I am sick I take fresh honey, ginger and garlic. They make me feel better.

Emma Rugg, Australian

We have rugbrød that is a very dark bread which is very healty because it is rich in whole grain and dietary fiber and contain little or no sugar, and is thus considered by many Danes as a healthy alternative to whiter types of bread. I never tried to bake it myself because it is a very long process, but my father does and it is always nice to come home and have the homemade smørrebred.

Ida Davidsen, Dane

I could find mangos in Berlin or kiwi from New Zeland, however they are not very fresh and it's not very good for the enviroment to buy foods that have been travelling half the world. So I do not like to buy them.

Emma Rugg, Australian

There is a popular Australian story that became a cartoon where a little koala - Blinky Bill - eats leaves from eucalyptus trees and these leaves have some medicinal benefits as his appendix can neutralise the toxins of the plants.

Emma Rugg, Australian

Prinzessinnengarten