A little over a year ago Transition Town Stoke Newington consisted of a few people, meeting up in pubs and wondering what to do next. They now have over 300 people on their mailing list, and also official Transition status.

Their first big event was at Abney Hall in January 2009 with speakers from Transition Brixton, Hackney Council and other community groups. Their first group project was a guerrilla gardening experiment in urban food growing. By the end of summer 2009 they had created a jungle of tomatoes, sweetcorn, broad beans, runner beans and cabbages. To promote interest in growing they also ran a campaign to fill Stoke Newington with sunflowers, distributing over 4000 packets of sunflower seeds to local school children.

As well as achieving 'official' status, perhaps the biggest change was finding what they describe as 'a spiritual home' in Pangea Project in Stamford Hill. This is held on a monthly basis, and features talks, films, live music and food (visit www.pangeaproject.co.uk for further info).

Their current projects include the following. The first is the Building's group's Home Energy Efficiency Refurb Project which is still actively looking for property owners of tenants interested in improving the efficiency of their home.:http://refurbn16.com/. Secondly, the food co-op is up and running. The focus is on reducing the cost of organic grocery goods (rather than fresh produce) by buying wholesale and distributing via Pangea Project. Thirdly, the Abney Hall event succeeded in raising the profile of TTSN, and they are planning on running another event in March. If you would like to get involved or have some local group or community enterprise you would like to see represented, then get in touch with them. Finally, they are currently in discussions with the family of Michael McCarthy about planting a memorial in the Levy memorial gardens at the top of Yoakley Road.

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