A communal garden (often used in the plural as communal gardens) is a (normally formal)
garden for shared use by a number of local residents, typically in an urban setting. The term is especially used in the
United Kingdom. The centre of many city squares and crescents (especially in
London, for example) are maintained as communal gardens.
Despite the name, and the fact that they typically look like small
public parks, such gardens are normally privately or jointly owned, with sharing of maintenance costs. Access may be restricted by locked gates, with keys available for residents, or only unlocked during daytime. They are often surrounded by tall railings designed to keep people out.
One of the scenes in the 1999 film
''Notting Hill'' involves the two main characters, Anna (
Julia Roberts) and William (
Hugh Grant), breaking into private and locked communal gardens by climbing over the wall at night after a dinner party. The communal gardens used were Rosmead Gardens in Rosmead Road,
Notting Hill, London.
Notting Hill film locations
, London, UK.
See also
* Allotment gardens
An allotment (British English), or in North America, a community garden, is a plot of land made available for individual, non-commercial gardening or growing food plants, so forming a kitchen garden away from the residence of the user. Such plot ...
* Arundel Gardens
Arundel Gardens is a street and a communal garden square in Notting Hill, London, one of seven streets between Ladbroke Grove and Kensington Park Road of which five share in a communal garden between them. It was built in the 1860s, towards the ...
, with communal gardens behind the houses
* Community garden
* Garden square
References
Types of garden
Urban planning
Town and country planning in the United Kingdom
*
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