Flowers bloom behind prison walls

4:08pm Tuesday 20th November 2007

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Wandsworth Prison, Southfields Tube station and the residents of Ham Parade have all received awards for their work bringing greenery to otherwise drab bits of south-west London.

London's Green Corners Awards were handed out by the Conservation Foundation today, marking the formation of the group by botanist David Bellamy 25 years ago.

The awards celebrate out-of-the-way gardens that make London a brighter and healthier place.

Wandsworth Prison picked up a Blooming Fantastic award for turning a bare area outside the jail hospital into a garden.

Southfields Tube station picked up the award for a garden that is "a colourful bed of mixed planting tended by station staff in their spare time", while Green Corner volunteers in Ham were recognised for providing a green area on a busy parade that includes seats to rest on, imaginative and ever changing planting and neat pathways.

Conservation Foundation's director, David Shreeve said the winners would receive an engraved Green Corners trowel, gift vouchers and a book as well as an invitation to take part in putting more greenery back into Covent Garden.

Green Corner winners included Greyhound Lane residents for transforming a former dumping ground into a flourishing courtyard garden, the Walk on the Wild Side garden at St George's Hospital, Tooting, and front gardens in Manville Road and Ritherdon Road, Wandsworth.