Woodland Design Revisited

The (Silk Wood Community Planting Project) SWCPP team were lucky enough to spend some time last month to look through the amazing woodland designs produced by various school groups last year. This was to choose one as a basis for the area designated to the next phase of planting.

We went through the piles of fantastic drawings school by school, and loved some of the ideas suggested – even if we can’t put them into this project. These included zip lines, lakes, zoos, campsites, dog zones, fountains, cinemas, mazes, water slides, wasp & bee hives, fruit orchards, ice cream parlours, flower tunnels and spider, hedgehog, horse and bone sculptures.

One of my absolute favourites was the ‘giant sculpture of me’ suggested by one confident pupil or the extremely accurate portrait of Project Manager Oscar Adams on another!

Beyond these wonderful ideas, we had to look at what would work in the new wood, and what paths could be joined to the existing routes within the arboretum. We also selected some which gave us some inspiration for the future- including a design where the paths were in the shape of a tree, and a couple which featured paths that led to an open glade or large tree to sit under.

This helped us whittle the choice down to 5 designs that will inspire the next stage of the Silk Wood Community Planting Project. Watch this space to see how the plans develop, and a massive well done and thank you to all involved!