Welcome to Climate Gardens and Homes
We design and deliver innovative climate engagement projects and events that inspire sustainable change .
We target over 50s living in the UK who have the highest carbon footprint and number 20 million adults (Centre for Aging Better).
We support over 50s to grow their personal legacy by making simple sustainable life choices. This can demonstrate their commitment to supporting a low carbon future for their children and grandchildren.
Our achievements to date plus seeds we are planting
RHS Gold Medal Garden at Hampton Court Flower Show
Our Gold Medal Near Future Garden at the RHS Hampton Court Flower Show was supported by celebrities who donated their footprints to our Carbon Path feature. Each celebrity wanted to highlight how easy it is to make simple sustainable life choices that can deliver a collective low carbon future.
Near Future Garden focused on the renewable energies of solar, wind and water that already power our gardens and are now being used to future-proof our homes with sustainable energy.
BBC TV Gardeners World created a 4 minute film about NFG which was seen by 1.5 million viewers. Our Climate Garden was visited by 10,000 people sharing their climate change garden and home experiences whilst walking on The Carbon Path embedded with celebrity footprints over 6 days at the RHS Hampton Court Flower Show.
Sustainable Gardening Workshops
A series of Future Gardens workshops at Herstmonceux Castle in East Sussex combined inspiring speakers with interactive coaching to deliver ongoing optimism that individual #climate action can make a difference to the #futurewechoose. These experiences created feelings of positivity and empowerment, instead of the confusion and fear that is often associated with climate change.
During these interactive events targeting over 50s we were able to provide ideas for personal low carbon actions to inspire each participant to explore making their own lives more sustainable.
After the workshops, 95% of guests said they were eager to explore their choices relating to a range of sustainable choices. These included only using peat free compost and being sustainable in their gardens, buying electric cars, switching to renewable energies, buying heat/air pumps or sourcing sustainable travel options as easy low carbon changes to their lives.
These engagement projects provided a unique opportunity for conversations with over 50s into their attitudes and behaviours around climate change. The results of this extensive face to face research, at the RHS Hampton Court Flower Show and our Future Workshops, have radically influenced and evolved our Future Communications Strategy
Read about our first Future Workshops which took place at Herstmonceux Castle in East Sussex
Planting Seeds to Grow Over 50s Low Carbon Legacies
A key request from our public engagement projects with the over 50’s has been the need for more guidance and support to help this age group make more effective and simple sustainable life choices.
Our Future Gardening Workshops confirmed that 85 % of 50s over want to make sustainable life choices but, they feel unsure and confused about how to do this successfully.
In addition recent research from Climate Talk by DEFRA confirms 80% of homeowners over 50 want to take #ClimateAction but they need help to achieve this.
Why are over 50’s a key target audience for Climate Gardens and Homes ?
Adults aged 50 to 64
have the highest UK carbon footprint compared to other age groups. (Greening the Greys, Stockholm Environment Institute, University of York)
Baby boomers born in post war Britain
are the first generation of consumerism with a carbon footprint of 13.52 tonnes of carbon dioxide per capita per year compared to 11.81 tonnes for the average UK citizen. Wealthier than ever before, they emit 1.69 tonnes on consumables, 15 per cent higher than the national average with the highest emissions for travel by car and plane at 2.51 tonnes of CO2 which is 28 per cent higher than the average UK citizen.
Over 50s hold 68.3% of all UK household wealth (£7.8 trillion)
77.3% of all financial wealth (£1.2 trillion) and 66.2% of allproperty wealth (£2.5 trillion). Source:The Saga Study, commissioned from the independent Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR). Lifetime mortgages provide options to unlock wealth, but, only 39% of equity release customers are using funds from lifetime mortgages for home improvements, with just 13% spending it on sustainable choices.(Legal and General)
The large majority own their own homes and gardens
where they regularly experience unpredictable weather patterns caused by climate change outside their own back doors.
Over 94% of over 50s visitors to our Gold Medal RHS Hampton Court Garden
said these increasing experiences of climate change in their own gardens helps them realise that extreme weather events and confused seasons are now a daily and ever increasing challenge in their lives and their children’s
Planting Community Seeds for Over 50s
Our research identified that over 50s enjoy being part of a community to share their climate concerns and connect with others who are exploring how they can embrace a more sustainable lifestyle.
This need for sustainable living advice delivered in a shared environment to support a low carbon future for the grandchildren of over 50s has inspired our Growing Sustainability Seeds Workshops.
What will our 2025 Sustainability Seeds Workshops deliver?
Building on previous workshops, we now plan to deliver a series of sustainability workshops in an iconic South East UK location in Autumn 2025 – exact details to be released in Spring 2025.
Each event will provide a “positive climate experience” for over 50s to explore the increasing choice of available low carbon living options. By combining the latest sustainable living trends with a stimulating workshop experience, we aim to motivate over 50s to realise how simple it is to reduce their personal carbon footprint.
These Sustainability Workshops will focus on our six simple sustainable living choices or “Petals” that our research has identified as crucial for over 50s. (see next section) .
Each “Petal” will be delivered by an expert sustainability speaker who brings their personal expertise and enthusiasm about the simple steps needed to make the path to sustainable living a reality for over 50s.
In 2026 these Sustainability Seeds workshops will grow all over the UK to create over 50s communities who are inspired by a collective and personal desire to commit to low carbon living. Our objective is to engage this high carbon, often wealthy and time rich over 50s audience to find “purpose” in securing a sustainable future for their children and grand children.
Climate Gardens and Homes can offer companies who are supporting the transition to a low carbon economy access to the high carbon footprint over 50s consumer audience at our exclusive 2025 events.
These invitation only events provide a unique opportunity to present your sustainable product or explain your low carbon service direct to an affluent over 50s consumers with both the funds and the time to invest in sustainable life choices.
Please note that in order to be considered for these events we will require evidence of your sustainability credentials. In particular the carbon footprint of your sustainabble product or low carbon services. This should include evidence of any supply chain for products that you are keen to offer our over 50s guests.
To find out more about the opportunities to communicate your product or service at one of our events/workshops in return for a negotiated sponsorship fee please contact:
deborah.climategardensandhomes@gmail.com
Six Simple Sustainability Petals to inspire over 50s
These six petals of sustainability are an opportunity for over 50s to use their considerable finances and maximise their available time to create a low carbon legacy for their family.
This process can also provide over 50s with a sense of purpose and personal satisfaction in later life.
Powering Green Homes
using energy efficient renewable energies such as solar power, ground or air source heat pumps or joining local community energy suppliers.
Gardening Sustainably
gardeners can easily reduce their impact on nature and encourage biodivesity with a range of sustainability choices. In particular only using peat free compost to protect the carbon stored in the UKs peat bogs and growing their own produce to reduce food miles.
Reduce Reuse Recycle
buying less and exploring how over 50s can reduce their consumer goods footprint in the home and garden whilst embracing the trend for reusing and recycling products they buy.
Using Low Carbon Transport
buying an electric car and installing charging source at home that links to over 50s domestic energy. This can boost their personal electricity supply, reducing the costs of heating their homes and making their car miles totally sustainable.
Green Banking and Sustainable Investments
ensuring banks, building societies and financial organisations that advise on their wealth are not investing in fossil fuels. Encouraging over 50s to use their considerable assets to support green tech and the clean energy market – over 50s hold 68% of UK financial wealth.
Exploring Sustainable Travel Options
to reduce over 50s high carbon foot print – over 50s have the highest emissions for travel by car and plane at 2.51 tonnes of CO2 which is 28 per cent higher than the average UK citizen.
Over 50’s spend 114 hours a year planting their gardens to enjoy in the future.
Transferring over 50’s passion and vision for the future of their gardens into making regular sustainable living choices has the ability to inspire their sense of purpose to leave a low carbon legacy.
Climate Gardens and Homes aims to encourage this high carbon over 50s community to understand how their passion for adapting their gardens to deal with extreme weather caused by climate change can deliver positive climate engagement.
How is climate change affecting our gardens?
Shifting Seasons
Daffodils flowering in December, seedlings destroyed by record rainfall during winter 2024 plus regular summer droughts highlight that extreme weather and shifting seasons are now everyday challenges for UK gardeners. The devastating impacts of climate change are happening every day in the UK, outside our back doors, in our gardens.
Longer Autumn Growing Season
Although the UK growing season lenghtening by 30 days over the past 10 years is seen as an advantage to gardeners, the increase in extreme weather events as a result of our shifting climate is a top concern for over 50s gardens and home owners.
Lack or Abundance of Water
is definitely a key concern. WaterAid research has revealed that a third (35%) of garden enthusiasts have struggled with water shortages and more than a third (38%) have experienced increased heat stress. One in eight UK adults with gardens ( 5.4 million) have experienced flooding in their green spaces. ( Flood RE). Innovative water management techniques are now key to creating and maintaining a beautiful but sustainable garden.
Lack of Winter Frosts
The number of days of air frost (when the air temperature drops below 0.0 °C) has reduced on average by 11.1 days in recent years ( Met Office)
UK Gardeners over 50 increasingly observe and have to manage extreme weather events as a result of climate change affecting their gardens and homes.
With 82% noticing their garden being affected by hotter summers and prolonged heavy rainfall, and 60% being concerned about how climate change might impact their outdoor spaces in the future, this is a unique opportunity for effective ‘ownership’ of this pressing environmental issue.
This ‘ownership’ of climate change was clearly evidenced when 10,000 visitors walked on Climate Gardens RHS Gold Medal Garden at Hampton Court Flower Show to share their personal stories of how their gardens are affected by a changing climate. We spoke directly to hundreds of visitors – many over 50s – all eager to understand how they can help the climate crisis by embedding sustainability into their everyday living – both in and out of their gardens.
How can gardens and gardening change behaviour?
Behavioural science reveals that ‘ ONLY PERSONAL EXPERIENCES’ can provide ‘OWNERSHIP’ of an issue and a strong motivation to change entrenched behaviour. Sadly reporting of climate change is often alarmist and characterized by images and words of catastrophe (Ereaut & Segnit 2006) As a result, powerful images of melting Artic ice caps, severe drought in Africa or flooding in India have failed to empower over 50s living in the UK to make sustainable life changes.
The enormous passion for gardening felt by many over 50s combined with an obsession for growing and caring for their plants, can be translated into their personal ‘ Low Carbon Climate Action’.
Climate Gardens and Homes transfers these ‘personal climate experiences’ and ‘concerns about gardening in a changing climate’ into positive engagement with planning for their families’ future by making more sustainability life choices now.
For centuries gardeners have exchanged stories about their gardens over the fence. They have used their personal stories and experiences of growing plants, flowers and produce to share advice and insights about how to produce the best plant displays. Our projects recreate this “sharing experience” of our changing climate whilst growing over 50s motivation to consider a range of sustainable living choices.
The Climate Change Collaboration confirmed: “the right story can build the public appetite needed to catalyse change. Decades of research and experience shows how personal stories can shift how people think and feel. They can make important actions feel right, normal and inevitable. Intentionally changing the story has shifted attitudes to things like tobacco control and equal marriage.”
Personal stories that are exchanged between home owners and gardeners about their experiences of our changing climate outside their windows can encourage action and a sense of “What can we do to help?” from the over 50s.
We are building a community that encourages this sharing of personal frustrations with shifting weather patterns that empower over 50s to focus on effective low carbon living choices for their families’ future. Our strategy is to inspire over 50s to think seriously about the uncertain climatic future facing their children and encourage them to examine and reduce their high carbon consumer habits. #TimeisNow
Share your personal experienced of climate change outside your window, in your garden. How does this make you feel?
Useful Resources
Weather to Garden Podcast
Listen to our Weather to Garden podcast with Peter Gibbs from Radio 4 Gardeners Question Time. Discover how climate change is driving UKs extreme weather and what this means for the collective future of our gardens and homes.
Greeing the Greys Research Paper
Read the Greening the Greys research paper from University of York, which provides evidence in support of the strategy for ClimateGardensAndHomes.com
Deborah Scott Anderson – Founder of Climate Gardens & Homes
With a professional background in Communications and training as a Climate Coach, I have experience of finding positive and innovative ways to engage a range of audiences with climate change that leads to #Climateactionnow.
Apart from creating Climate Gardens in 2013, I have written 900 posts on myclimatechangegarden.com, and contributed to various articles and podcasts focused on gardening in a changing climate. These include a podcast with Peter Gibbs, BBC Weatherman and host of BBC Radio 4 Gardeners Question Time plus an interview with the Yale Communications Centre for Climate Communication.
In 2024 I became an Agile Homes Associate to expand a personal passion for sustainable living. Agile Homes are based in Bristol where they design, make and deliver Low Carbon Homes to support the UK transition to sustainable living.
This opportunity inspired the expansion of Climate Gardens into Climate Gardens and Homes to promote sustainable living to over 50s, who have the highest UK carbon footprint.They also often have children and grandchildren who increasingly face an uncertain climatic future as extreme weather becomes part of their daily lives.
How to get involved
If you would like to be involved with Climate Gardens and Homes or are interested in exploring how to exhibit at our Workshops and Events in the future please contact deborah.climategardensandhomes@gmail.com
