As I wandered through Richmond Centre last Tuesday, something unexpected caught my eye among the typical retail storefronts – shoots of green sprouting from raised garden beds in what was once merely a pedestrian thoroughfare. The mall’s community garden has returned for its second season, bringing a dash of urban agriculture to one of Metro Vancouver’s busiest shopping destinations.
“We wanted to create something that brings people together while teaching practical skills,” explained Sarah Chen, Richmond Centre’s community engagement coordinator, as she showed me the newly installed beds. “Last year’s response was overwhelming. People kept asking when we’d bring it back.”
The garden installation, which features eight raised beds near the mall’s south entrance, will host free weekly workshops starting this Saturday. Sessions will cover everything from seed starting to harvesting techniques – practical knowledge increasingly valued in our era of food security concerns and rising grocery costs.
For Richmond resident Mei Wong, who participated last year, the garden offered unexpected benefits. “I live in an apartment with no balcony. This was my first chance to grow anything,” she told me while inspecting the freshly tilled soil. “My kids learned where food actually comes from – not just the grocery store.”
What makes this initiative stand out is its accessibility. Unlike community garden plots with long waitlists, these workshops are drop-in events open to anyone passing through the mall. The program addresses a growing demand for green space in Richmond, where densification has limited gardening opportunities for many residents.
According to Statistics Canada data, nearly 68% of Richmond households live in multi-unit dwellings, many without access to outdoor growing space. This reality has sparked creative solutions across the Lower Mainland, with the Richmond Centre garden representing a new model of public-private partnership in urban greening.
Mall ownership partnered with Urban Bounty (formerly Richmond Food Security Society) to design the program. “We’re teaching more than gardening,” noted Ian Chang, Urban Bounty’s outreach coordinator. “We’re building community resilience and showing how unused urban spaces can become productive.”
The workshops will run every Saturday from 1-3 p.m. through October, with special focus sessions on growing culturally diverse foods that reflect Richmond’s multicultural community. Participants can expect to learn about Asian greens, Mediterranean herbs, and traditional Indigenous plants.
“Last year we grew bok choy, gai lan, and herbs I’d never even heard of,” said Michael Torres, a regular mall visitor who stumbled upon the garden last season. “I started using the techniques at home in containers on my balcony. Now my kids actually eat vegetables they’ve helped grow.”
Richmond City Councillor Emma Ng, who supported the project through the city’s community sustainability initiative, sees the garden as addressing multiple civic priorities. “This tackles food security, climate action, and community building all at once,” she explained during a site visit last week. “It’s exactly the kind of partnership we need more of.”
The garden arrives at a time when interest in home growing has surged. According to a 2023 survey by the BC Food Security Network, 74% of British Columbians expressed interest in growing some of their own food, though only 31% reported having adequate space to do so.
What’s harvested doesn’t go to waste either. Produce from the mall garden is donated to the Richmond Food Bank and community kitchens, with workshop participants occasionally taking home samples of their work. Last year, the garden produced over 230 kilograms of fresh vegetables from its modest footprint.
“We’re not going to solve food insecurity with a few garden beds,” acknowledged Paul Wong, Richmond Food Bank director. “But we’re showing what’s possible in urban spaces while providing the freshest possible produce to those who need it most.”
The program has sparked interest beyond Richmond, with representatives from three other shopping centres in the Lower Mainland visiting to explore similar initiatives.
For those interested in participating, no registration is required for the weekly workshops. Additional information is posted on signs throughout the mall and on Richmond Centre’s website. The first session this Saturday will focus on spring planting techniques and include free seed packets for participants.
As I left the mall, I noticed a group of seniors stopping to examine the garden beds, pointing to newly installed signs identifying what would soon grow there. One woman pulled out her phone to take a picture of the workshop schedule.
In the concrete landscape of suburban retail, these small patches of soil represent something more than a trendy sustainability initiative. They’ve become unexpected places of learning, connection, and growth – transforming a place typically associated with consumption into one of production.
