A new therapeutic garden at Shields Health Hub in North Shields, formerly known as Priory Day Hospital, has been completed as part of the Healthy Happy Places programme.
Focused on creating and supporting good mental health and wellbeing through its connection with the built and designed environment in the North East and North Cumbria, the programme is a collective engagement between North Shields Primary Care Network, NHS Property Services, NHS Northumbria Healthcare Foundation Trust, VODA, North Tyneside Art Studio, North Tyneside Council, Health Innovation North East North Cumbria (HI NENC), and the North East North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB). The participating organisations say it is ‘innovative in enhancing mental health and well-being by synergising planning, regeneration, design, healthcare, public health, arts, and community efforts’.
With investment from its Corporate Social Responsibility Fund, NHSPS subsidised the garden’s construction, ‘actively exploring avenues to reduce costs and fostering collaboration with existing contractors and volunteers’. Health Innovation North East North Cumbria and North Shields Primary Care Network also contributed funding and resources.
The aim is to provide offer a place of sanctuary and activity that will also benefit the local community – including via social prescribing services and use by charities.
Jo Beynon, Specialist Psychological Therapist at the Hub, said: “Green Spaces move the autonomic nervous system into a ventral vagal response of calm and connection. I have spent time in the garden with clients as a way of experiencing calm. We have used the smells of the herbs and the tastes of strawberries to connect with sensory experiences.”
North Tyneside Art Studio played ‘a pivotal role’ in the design process and the integration of community artwork, while The Garden at the Hub Community Association, VODA, and North Tyneside Council’s Public Health Team, provided funding, ideas, and support. The engagement phase involved participatory activities, including a model garden to capture feedback, and prompt cards asking what people would like to see, how they would like to feel, and what they would like to do, in the garden.
Dr. Rachel Turnbull, Healthy Happy Places Programme manager, explained: “Healthy Happy Places is about ways we can use the built and natural environment to create better mental health and wellbeing in our communities – doing this through mixing and combining experiences from different sectors and communities. The garden has been a lovely way to show what we can achieve if we work together to turn unloved places into creative, joyful, soothing, calm spaces.”