A place to grow: Well-being and activism on Edinburgh’s post-war allotments and how this can inform urban gardening in Scotland today

Between 1945 and 1970, allotments which had been established in Scottish cities during the Second World War were removed by local authorities to build new housing, schools and playing fields. This was a crisis for the plotholders, who had formed communities on the allotments and found gardening to be highly beneficial to their physical and mental health. This article takes an archive-driven approach using the history of post-war allotments as a direct parallel to community gardens in Scottish cities today, which are often praised for their positive outcomes in local communities for health and well-being but are frequently only temporary, established precariously on land earmarked for development. The article argues that for urban gardening to be truly beneficial for health and well-being, permanence is needed to remove the negative stresses of possible closures.