Page 88 - Phonebox Magazine August 2011

Above shows before the main work started
Barclays Group come to the aid of Clifton Court
As part of our Group Citizenship agenda, Barclaycard's staff are committed to helping the community with each employee dedicating two working days to projects in local communities and our support goes to a wide range of causes such as hospitals, hospices, local businesses, schools and other community groups.
Here in the Barclaycard Legal & Compliance team, we were recently looking for a project where we could make a real difference to the community close to where we work. The team is mostly based in Northampton (although we do also have colleagues in Canary Wharf and Cardiff) so we started our search for a worthwhile project in the Northampton area. One of our team members lives in Olney and walks her dog past the gardens at Clifton Court. The garden at the back of Clifton Court had not been developed and it was clear that it would be difficult for the residents to make good use of it without some work being done and so the seed of the idea was planted for this to be a potential project for our team. After some discussion and organisation within Barclaycard and with the management and residents of Clifton Court, we quickly set to work on how we could best utilise our resources to transform the piece of land - the before and after pictures speak for themselves.
Local businesses were incredibly supportive with advice and expertise. We have been overwhelmed by the contributions of others, especially:
Sue Gilbert, Gardens by Design in Olney
Acorn Nurseries in Emberton for supplying the plants
All of our suppliers - Martin at George Davies, Burdens, MBC Building Supplies and DW Bodley Fencing
The additional assistance from Mark Jeffries, John McGuire and Neil Gordge Olney Town Council - Cllr John Boardman
The warden Julia (below, centre) and all of the residents at Clifton Court And final thanks go to the team who have done such a fantastic job.
88 Phonebox Magazine