We turn empty lots into gardens, surplus into suppers, and teenagers into the people who grow the next one.
Why we do this
It started with one fenced-off lot on Halsted Avenue and a folding table of donated seedlings. Six summers later, that block grows food the whole street eats — and the kids who planted it now run the harvest. We believe a neighborhood that grows together stops going hungry alone.
41,200
Meals Shared This Year
14
Gardens Across the City
63
Youth Apprentices
What we grow
Three programs, one rooted idea
01 · The Gardens
Community Gardens
Fourteen plots on reclaimed lots, free to any neighbor with a packet of seeds. We build the beds, fix the soil, and turn on the water — the block does the rest, all season long.
02 · The Table
The Food Share
Every Saturday we sort garden harvest and rescued grocery surplus into free shares — no forms, no proof, no questions. Take a bag, leave a bag. Last year that was forty-one thousand meals.
03 · The Next Ones
Youth Apprenticeship
A paid summer for teens who run a garden start to finish — soil to market stall — and bank real wages, a reference, and the knowledge that they grew something a neighborhood now counts on.
Ways to give
What your gift actually grows
Every dollar lands a block away, not in an overhead column. Here is what each gift does, in real harvests and real hours.
$25
Seeds, soil, and starts for one new raised bed — a season of greens for a family who plants it.
$100
A full Saturday of the Food Share: roughly 220 free meals sorted, bagged, and carried home.
$500
A youth apprentice's paid month — wages, tools, and a mentor through their first real harvest.
Your time
Saturday mornings at any garden or the share table. No experience needed — we'll hand you a trowel and a neighbor to work beside.
Come Saturday. Bring nothing but the morning — we'll put a trowel in your hands and a neighbor beside you.
