DPU's Liza Griffin has co-authored a community garden guide designed to support people with dementia

The guide is intended to provide community gardens with the information and sources of support they need to make their spaces and facilities welcoming for people living with dementia. There are over 55 million people worldwide living with dementia and it is the seventh leading cause of death among all diseases and one of the major causes of disability (WHO 2022). It has physical, psychological, social and economic impacts, not only for people living with the disease, but also for carers, families and society at large.

By focusing on how we can actively transform spaces to make them more dementia-friendly, instead of focusing only on what people living with dementia find difficult, this guide can help to make community gardens empowering environments for visitors and volunteers. The guide was specifically designed to help people enjoy and access community gardens with confidence, agency and dignity. 

It was collaboratively produced with suggestions and guidance from two community gardens, and with researchers working on wellbeing, health, and dementia. It is based upon an extensive academic review of the evidence on wellbeing, dementia, gardens and gardening. The research underpinning the work was funded by UCL’s Grand Challenges and DPU.

DPU’s Liza Griffin wrote the guide with Jack Ashton (UCL alumnus and Calthorpe Community Garden volunteer), Moïse Roche (Division of Psychiatry, UCL), Sebastian Crutch (Dementia Research Centre, UCL), Claire Waddington (Rare Dementia Support, UCL), Claudia Cooper (Division of Psychiatry, UCL), and Kay Pallaris (Mapping Futures and member of the Crofton Park Railway Group). The guide was graphic designed by Ottavia Pasta. 

The guide can be downloaded here - Supporting People with Dementia: A Guide for Community Gardens

How to cite the guide: Griffin, Liza, Jack Ashton, Moise Roche, Sebastian Crutch, Claire Waddington, Claudia Cooper, and Kay Pallaris. 2022. Supporting People with Dementia: A Guide for Community Gardens. London: University College London.  

Supporting People with Dementia: A Guide for Community Gardens by Liza Griffin, Jack Ashton, Moise Roche, Sebastian Crutch, Claire Waddington, Claudia Cooper and Kay Pallaris is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.