Living Woodlands

We can help you bring the benefits of native woodlands into the heart of your town and community: connecting people with nature, helping to mitigate the impacts of climate change, increasing biodiversity and providing wildlife habitats.

What are Tiny Forests?

Tiny Forests are small and rapidly growing native forests designed for urban areas. This is an unique and proven technique for creating natural and biodiverse forests in town and cities. What makes this an amazing opportunity for businesses, schools and other organisations in urban areas is the relatively small area needed (the size of a tennis court is possible) and ...

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What are Tiny Forests?

Tiny Forests are small and rapidly growing native forests designed for urban areas. This is an unique and prov...

Read more

Join the communities already benefitting from starting a Living Woodlands

You'll get guides and resources on how to bring this idea to life.

There is no funding available for this idea, but these resources will still help to make your project happen!

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“We’re excited to develop a Tiny Forest at Tait House. We believe it will be integral in enhancing local biodiversity and in helping the local community to learn about the range of ways in which they can restore their local environment”.

Living Woodlands
Tait House Community Enterprise

How to start a project on ChangeX

  • 1

    Create your project page

    Click the green start button to register and set up your project page. It’s quick, free and easy.

  • 2

    Complete a 30 Day Challenge

    Complete simple steps in 30 days to get your project off the ground.

  • 3

    Activate your project

    Follow the 5 Step Guide and your action plan to bring the project to life.

  • 4

    Share impact

    Share impact by posting a summary and photos and completing a survey.

Living Woodlands project essentials

5 Step Guide

Time

Suggested: The planting season is from late November to February so it's best to start the planning stage before autumn. From the first site survey to planting day could be as short as 4 weeks. After planting and mulching is completed, the Tiny Forest is left to grow with minimal interference - perhaps only watering in a drought and some weeding in the first year. After two to three years, it should be left to grow and evolve like a wild, native woodland.

Resources

More information on how to get started and any resources shared by the Living Woodlands

Meet the Social Innovator

Partner with Living Woodlands in the creation of a Tiny Forest for your community and we will provide all the expertise, materials and contractors required while supporting you from the initial planning through to completion and management.

John and Colm Galvin (founders of Living Woodlands)

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Why a 30 day challenge?

    The 30 Day Challenge was developed by our Team based on our experience working with communities. We’ve learned that the first weeks are critical to build momentum and get off to a good start with any community project. Teams who complete these steps within the first month are much more likely to successfully complete their project!

    The Challenge is a series of simple steps that each applicant has to complete to get their project off the ground and unlock funding, if there is funding currently available for that idea in your region. Steps include watching a video and/or reading content, having a call with a ChangeX team member, forming a team so that you have support, having your first team meeting, sharing a team photo, and sharing a project action plan.

  • What can funding be used for?

    Once funding is received it can be used to cover direct set-up costs of the new community project. For example space rental, insurance fees, seeds and planting materials, tools, training fees; pretty much any materials you might need for a project that benefits your community.

    Funds cannot be used for the costs of work that has already been carried out, costs unrelated to the setup and maintenance of the new project, payments to group members for their work on the project. Funds can’t be used for the promotion of religious causes, non-charitable activities, sponsorship or fundraising events. Please read the terms and conditions for further details.

  • How do I know if there is funding available?

    On idea pages, if there is funding available for the idea in your region you will see “Funding available” and the region listed in the turquoise box. When you first login you will also see a green banner at the top of the screen saying “live funds near you” if there is funding available in your region. The ChangeX homepage will feature those live funds near you.

    A note on the waitlist: when all the funding has been allocated to applicants, new applicants will go on a waitlist. If some applicants that are in the fund don’t successfully complete the 30 Day Challenge their funding will be released and can be then allocated to those on the waitlist. To see if you are going on a waitlist check the main fund page, ideas fully allocated will have the note “Join the waitlist” instead of “Apply to start”.

  • What is ChangeX?

    ChangeX is a platform that connects communities to proven ideas and funding.

    By empowering local changemakers with proven ideas from social innovators and accessible funding from our partners, we aim to build healthier, more inclusive and sustainable communities. Our work is aligned to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and together with our partners, we aim to impact 1 billion people globally by 2030.

    • Communities: Get the funding, resources and support you need to start impactful projects in your community.
    • Social innovators: Connect with local changemakers, access funding to scale your idea, and impact more communities globally.
    • Funders: Fund the themes and regions they care most about, with measurable impact, and at global scale.

    We believe that by bringing the best social innovations and the world’s changemakers together in a shared community, we can accelerate the spread of innovations across the world and have a bigger impact. Together we aim to unleash the potential of changemakers by enabling collaboration, by sharing knowledge and resources, by connecting changemakers across different disciplines and innovations and by opening up access to the world’s best proven social innovations to everyone.

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