A community garden at the heart of Cape Town’s first and oldest township, Langa, is growing more than just herbs and veggies: it’s helping to grow financial and emotional resilience.
Lemon and pomegranate fruit trees, buchu, chilli and peppermint plants, bitter aloe, cat’s tail, and aromatic sage … Charlotta Carolissen has some major plans for iKhaya le Langa’s community garden, set in the heart of Langa – Cape Town’s first and oldest township.
Founded by Tony Elvin, iKhaya le Langa (House of Sun) is a social enterprise project that’s turned a disused school and its grounds into a thriving community enterprise hub, including a canteen and kitchen (the Sun Diner), barista Asekho serving up artisan coffee from a lime- green container named Asemjey’s, a shop and art gallery where local artists showcase and sell their work, rooms for training and teaching, and office space with desks and computers where entrepreneurs can rent what they need to run their small businesses.
‘I’d been volunteering at iKhaya le Langa once a week for a year,’ explains Charlotta. But as a landscape gardener with over 15 years of experience creating green community spaces and public parks, Charlotta found the expansive tar spaces at iKhaya le Langa too alluring to resist. ‘I approached Tony with an idea to create a community garden. The vision was to achieve five things: create a secure space to grow plant stock that could be used by the local community; provide education on how to grow and harvest nature; create jobs; build economic opportunities from the space; and offer emotional well-being through nature for the surrounding community.’
Charlotta started on her dream in January this year, hacking up the tar with a group of community volunteers who form part of the job-readiness programme offered at iKhaya le Langa. While the space is nowhere near complete – due to a lack of funding – it’s already bearing fruit for locals. Charlotta explains: ‘We need water tanks and more equipment. Once we have one plant species, I teach our volunteers to create cuttings to grow more. Our chilli plants have been multiplied and shared across the community countless times.’ It’s part of the garden’s iChilli le Langa Sauce Programme: homeowners are given a plant, and are paid per gram of chillies they successfully harvest, which is then turned into sauce.
For iKhaya le Langa’s resident barista, Asekho, peppermint and buchu grown in the garden provide him with herbs to create artisanal indigenous teas, which he then sells to visiting tourists. ‘The vision is that the garden becomes an education centre,’ smiles Charlotta. ‘I would love to see a mini Kirstenbosch here; to create an extremely beautiful area in the middle of Langa. Beautiful spaces change communities, and nature has a way of pulling us all together.’
The community garden is also a critical part of iKhaya le Langa’s larger vision to become a vibey tourist spot in the heart of Langa, encouraging visitors to experience the richness of Langa for themselves and, of course, to spend their money at local spots. And it’s well on its way to achieving this vision. Already, you can book a cycle tour of Langa with one of iKhaya le Langa’s entrepreneurs, who will guide you as you pedal through the bustling streets of the community. You can order delicious fare at the Sun Diner on your return, take in vivid artworks in the gallery space, and – of course – end your trip with a steaming cup of tea or coffee at Asemjey’s.
Charlotta also has plans for a marketspace, veggie patch, and an outdoor meeting and cinema space – but it’s all going to take time, and money. ‘We don’t have any proper funding at this stage, so we’re doing what we can with what we have, building towards the masterplan,’ she explains.
Importantly, this community garden has allowed locals to unleash their green fingers during lockdown. ‘People have come to collect plants and cuttings so they can grow their own things while movement is restricted,’ says Charlotta. ‘I think COVID-19 in general has forced us all to look inwards at ourselves and our communities, and to think more locally. I think it will encourage us to grow ourselves more, and to find peace amidst the chaos in nature.’
But it hasn’t just been the plants that have proven important during lockdown; iKhaya le Langa transformed into something of a distribution centre, creating the Lockdown Lunch Club and distributing meals to socially excluded males in the community, as well becoming a source of accurate information. ‘Our ambassadors have been busting myths around COVID-19, sharing important news about the pandemic, how to prevent it, what you can and can’t do during lockdown, to the wider community,’ adds Charlotta.
As lockdown restrictions lift, iKhaya le Langa and its community garden will once again open its doors to visitors, mitigating the downturn in international tourism by focusing on the domestic ‘staycation’ market. Charlotta is focused on growing a green space that gives back in a plethora of ways: economically, socially and emotionally. ‘It doesn’t matter where you’re from, we’re all drawn to nature,’ says Charlotta.‘We’re all healed by nature and comforted by it.’
Words: Sarah Browning-de Villiers | Images: Charlotta Carolissen, Unsplash
