First New York City Community Garden

— Houston at Bowery —

In 1973, artist Liz Christie and her band of volunteers transformed a vacant lot at this site to create the Bowery-Houston Community Farm and Garden. Her Green Guerillas cleared garbage, built soil from police-stable manure, and planted trees, flowers, and vegetables.
More than 600 community gardens now grace New York City neighborhoods.
Generations of volunteer gardeners have enhanced the design, recruited members, and opened this garden to the public weekends and some evenings.
In 2004, the garden faced an existential threat from the development of surrounding lots by AvalonBay. Thanks to action from garden members, the community, city officials and the Parks Department, the garden not only survived but was expanded to Second Avenue.
The Liz Christie Garden is famous worldwide for its beauty as well as its unlikely formation. With its dedicated, all-volunteer membership, it continues to prosper even as the neighborhood changes.

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