Bethnal Green Nature Reserve (BGNR) is offering small community grants for workshops and talks that explore ecology, community, and our changing environment.

Programme Focus: Climate Change & Climate Adaptation

The Community Ecologies 2026 programme will focus on climate change and climate adaptation. Only proposals that clearly engage with climate change will be considered.

Climate change can feel overwhelming and abstract, often leading people to disengage. We are looking for projects that reconnect people to the conversation in experimental, accessible, and surprising ways. This might include workshops, walks, talks, creative or practical interventions, and cultural or social responses.

You can find the application link here.

What is Climate Change?

Climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns, primarily caused by human activity, especially the burning of fossil fuels. These changes affect ecosystems, health, housing, food systems, and the everyday lives of communities.

Climate adaptation is the practice of preparing for the ways our climate is already changing and will continue to change. Adaptation can be approached from many perspectives, including:

• Practical changes to infrastructure, horticulture, and conservation.

• Social and cultural adaptations that support communities (human and more-than-human) to thrive.

In an urban setting like Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, climate adaptation might include:

• Planting drought-tolerant trees to provide shade and reduce the urban heat island effect.

• Art or creative workshops that help people develop language and confidence to talk about climate change.

• Talks and discussion around social justice and decolonisation in a time of climate change.

Forage & Preserve: Wild Food Skills by Magdalena Gomez

What We’re Looking For

In 2026, Community Ecologies will explore climate change through multiple perspectives and lived experiences. We invite proposals that help people engage with climate challenges through agency, curiosity, and care, rather than avoidance or overwhelm. We are especially interested in ideas rooted in:

• Everyday knowledge

• Local lived experience

• Healthy relationships between people, place, and the non-human world

Proposals might focus on (for reference only)

• Habitat building, community health and wellbeing, cultural or creative practices, political debate and activism, practical, neighbourhood-based solutions

Butoh Movement Workshop by Elspeth Chan Chi Fan

Example projects & themes (for reference only)

These examples are intended to show the possible scope of the programme:

• Shared learnings on community mutual aid
  Idea sharing or system building to support vulnerable neighbours during extreme weather events, such as heatwaves e.g evening walking groups in summer to reduce isolation and encourage safe outdoor activity after dark, community cooking groups that promote hydration and nutrition, and the development of a daily check-in system to help people stay connected and supported.
  
  

• Neighbourhood climate resilience
  Knowledge sharing exploring ecological support strategies for hotter, drier summers e.g. learning how to identify stressed trees and plants in the local area and how to build kinship of support and adaptation
  
  

• Public land stewardship
  Shared learnings for communities around securing, governing, and caring for shared land for food security & nurturing biodiverse habitats in cities e.g. grassroots knowledge on how to make green spaces more accessible e.g. local composting systems
  
  

• Knowledge stewardship
  Exploring social justice and ecological learning through storytelling, performance and art-making.
  
  

• Advocacy labs
  The art of protest, exploring practical advocacy skills such as visualising potential futures, public speaking, demonstrating and writing
  
  

• Collective care
  Workshops that hold the emotional complexity of climate change, including grief, shame, denial, guilt, and joy
  
  

• Planetary boundaries
  Exploring ecological limits that exacerbate the climate crisis, each as a potential starting point for a workshop or discussion

Embodied Drawing Workshop by Kirsty Badenoch

Practical Information

Fee: based on BGNR £20 per hour rate

• £120 per session (60 minutes)

• £40 for expenses and consumables (if unspent can be claimed as preparation time)

Schedule:

• Saturdays, 3pm–4pm (when the clocks change towards the end of the year we will adjust timings according to the light).

• During Bethnal Green Nature Reserve public opening hour.

• Online proposals will be scheduled outside of opening hours.

Workshop suitability:
Workshops should be deliverable within your existing skills or lived experience and should not require extensive planning.

Please indicate in your proposal:

• If your workshop is season-dependent (e.g. spring, summer, or autumn) and if your proposal is online.

• If your proposal has reason for being scheduled outside of the allotted time frame (e.g. Moth Survey at night).

Recommended Time Allocation:

• 1.5 hours delivery e.g. 15 minutes welcome/introduction, 60 minutes workshop, 15 minutes check-out/conclusion.
• 4.5 hours preparation (including set-up and pack-down if required).

Workshop Formats (for reference only)

Workshops may take the form of talks or presentations, local walks, skill-sharing sessions, crafting or making, demonstrations, community forums. Workshops should take place within Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, online or in the immediate local area. If taking place off-site, the session should be close enough to start and finish at the reserve.

We can accommodate up to three online talks within the 2026 programme. We promote events locally through posters, our social media channels, and our newsletter. As events are open to the public, we cannot guarantee audience numbers; however, last year attendance averaged around 10 - 12 people per event.

Please indicate in your application if there is a maximum number of participants you are able to host. Please also note that children may attend with an accompanying adult, and adults are asked not to leave children unattended at any time. On the day, a member of staff will be present to support set-up and help manage audience numbers.

Unravelling the Patterns of Nature by Anand & Eden

Payment & Support

Payment:

• Paid by invoice within one week of the 28th of each month. Late invoices will be processed the following month

• Advance payment for materials can be arranged

BGNR support includes:

• Promotion (local posters, social media, WhatsApp groups, website)

• Public and employer liability insurance

• Tables, chairs, and hot drinks

• Staff support on the day (set-up, documentation, and pack-down)

Timeline

• Deadline for proposals: Midnight, 16 February 2026

• Review period: 17 February – 9 March 2026

• Notification of selection: 10 March 2026

• Programme dates: Fortnightly, 2 May – 28 November 2026

You can find the application link here.

Wild Food Walk by Thanusan Gunablasingham

A selection of our 2025 workshops

Our 2025 Community Ecologies programme brought local residents, artists, chefs, horticulturalists, foragers, ecologists, and educators together to explore the connections between people, place, and the natural world. The programme created opportunities for co-learning, creativity, and skill exchange rooted in the unique urban ecology of our urban nature reserve. It invited the community to co-create practices that support both environmental and social wellbeing, making the reserve a living laboratory for resilience and connection.

The Colours of Herbs — Odhran
📅 Sat 6 Sep · 3–4pm
Experience the colours of medicinal herbs through a sensory plant walk, tea tasting, and creative mapping.

Forage & Preserve: Wild Food Skills for Urban Ecology — Magdalena
📅 Sat 20 Sep · 3–4pm
Learn to identify, harvest, and preserve wild urban plants with practical skills like pickling and fermenting.

Embodied Drawing Workshop — Kirsty
📅 Sat 4 Oct · 3–4pm
Explore nature’s cycles and the beauty of decay through intuitive, playful drawing.

Collective Cartographies — Leela
📅 Sat 18 Oct · 3–4pm
Create a collaborative map of the reserve, weaving together memories and climate-aware visions.

Butoh Movement Workshop — Elspeth Chan Chi Fan
📅 Sat 1 Nov · 3–4pm
Connect body and environment through Butoh-inspired movement, blending imagination, fluidity, and ecological awareness.

Unravelling the Patterns of Nature — Anand & Eden
📅 Sat 15 Nov · 3–4pm
Discover nature’s hidden rhythms through sound, pattern, and creative making.

Wild Food Walk — Than
📅 Sat 29 Nov · 3–4pm
Join a guided walk to explore the edible and medicinal uses of wild plants in the reserve.

Creative Plant Naming — Yaya
📅 21 Jun · 3–4pm
A sensory workshop using tea tasting, smell, and drawing to connect with plants and reimagine how we name them.

Providing Solitary Bees with Bed and Board — Eamonn Postlethwaite
📅 12 Jul · 3–4pm
Discover the bees of Bethnal Green, learn to identify species, and help build a new bee habitat in the reserve.

Singing with the Birds — Catherine Clover
📅 26 Jul · 3–4pm
Learn to mimic the bird songs heard around the reserve in this fun, no-experience-needed vocal workshop.