Sprouting from the Ashes: Radical Community Gardening in the East Village and Lower East Side

The 1960s and 70s were challenging times in the East Village and Lower East Side. Due to the City’s looming financial crisis and the exodus of many wealthier New Yorkers to the suburbs, the neighborhoods became peppered with vacant, abandoned, and burned-down lots. In light of the neglect from city officials, residents took the beautification of streets into their own hands. Community groups began using gardening as a neighborhood rehabilitation strategy. Gardening efforts were led by many, including the Green Guerillas and local residents Luis Torres and José Ayala.

Started in 1973 by Liz Christy, Amos Taylor and Martin Gallent, the Green Guerillas began by throwing “seed bombs” into local vacant lots in place of legal access to gardening space. They soon expanded to supporting the creation of local community gardens. With the proliferation of many unofficial community gardens, in 1978 the city of New York officially acknowledged the local efforts by establishing the Green Thumb program. This program was started to regulate the unofficial use of land by issuing leases for abandoned lots; and to supply tools, seeds, and chain link fencing for enclosing community gardens.

The Green Guerillas and other community activists were key players in the foundation of the community gardens that exist today. Without the steadfast dedication of these residents, many of whom were Latino/Hispanic, the past fifty years of gardening activism in the East Village and Lower East Side would not have been possible.

The community gardens outlined below are a part of our East Village Building Blocks. This online web tool provides invaluable information about over 2,200 properties in the East Village, including each building’s date of construction, original architect, original use, and more.

El Jardin del Paradiso – 704 East 5th Street | Block: 374 | Lot #10-16, 59-64

El Jardin del Paraiso is a ¾-acre community garden located on 5th Street between Avenues C and D. Since its creation in the 1980s, the garden has aimed to revitalize the surrounding neighborhood and provide green space and programming for the local community.

Between 1900 and 1980, ten tenement buildings on the site—one of which was home to Allen Ginsberg from 1964 to 65—were demolished. The lots remained vacant for many years before unofficially becoming community green space as part of the 1970s-1980s community gardening movement.

In 1981, El Jardín del Paraíso was established. Nine contiguous city-owned lots were leased to the community through the Green Thumb initiative. That same year, efforts to make El Jardín del Paraíso a permanent park began, led by a coalition of homesteaders, religious leaders, the Junior League, and the principal of P.S. 15. In 1999, the park acquired three additional lots and was officially designated a park by the New York City Planning Commission.

Major renovations occurred between 2004 and 2009, which included the construction or renovation of areas such as the woodland, wetland, meadow, children’s discovery zone, and flower and vegetable gardens. Landscape architect Marie Stella redesigned the park, with input from gardeners and local community members. The design was implemented through a combination of city resources, volunteer efforts, and community labor.

El Jardín del Paraíso hosts ongoing projects and programs, including a water recycling initiative and educational programs for students from elementary school through college. The park has also organized numerous cultural events, such as sculpture exhibitions, music, dance, and theater performances, children’s film screenings, jazz concerts, puppet-making workshops and performances, bicycle workshops, and mural painting.

An 11-member steering committee oversees El Jardin’s membership, which consists of about 60 local residents.

El Sol Brillante – 530 East 12th Street | Block : 405 | Lot #23

Located on East 12th Street between Avenues A and B, El Sol Brillante offers community and educational programs, garden plot tenancy, and communal gardening.

In 1976, four buildings on East 12th Street were demolished. Members of the local 11th Street Movement began advocating for the development of a community garden on the vacant lots as part of the area’s rehabilitation. A larger community task force was formed to make this happen, with the support of a resident architect, the Horticultural Society of New York (for gardening advice), the Cornell Cooperative Extension Service (for gardening advice), and the CETA Summer Youth Corps (for labor and jobs for kids). Together, they developed plans for what would become El Sol Brillante.

With help from the Trust for Public Land, a nonprofit land trust was established in 1978, and the lot was acquired in 1980. Today, the park is a 1,000-square-foot vegetable garden with 40 plots, serving as a community green space. This membership-based garden also features a composting education center, offering numerous demonstrations for local schools. Public events are regularly held, including music performances, writing workshops, and meditation sessions.

El Sol Brillante is enclosed by a wrought-iron fence that features the charming, unique designs of artist Julie Dermansky.

La Plaza Cultural de Armando Perez – East 9th Street & Avenue C | Block : 391 | Lot #24

La Plaza Cultural de Armando Perez Community Garden is a unique open-air theater and green space, combining the functions of a community garden, a park and play area, wildlife refuge and performance venue. Thousands of people from diverse cultures use the space every year. It is a vital arena for theater, dance, music, art and social gatherings. In 2003, La Plaza was renamed in memory of Armando Perez, a CHARAS founder and former District Leader of the Lower East Side who was killed in 1999.

La Plaza Cultural de Armando Perez Community Garden was founded in 1976 by local residents and greening activists who took over what were then a series of vacant city lots piled high with rubble and trash. In an effort to improve the neighborhood during a downward trend of disinvestment, arson, drugs, and abandonment common in that era, members of the Latino group CHARAS cleared out truckloads of refuse. Working with Buckminster Fuller, they built a geodesic dome in the open “plaza” and began staging cultural events. Green Guerillas pioneer Liz Christy seeded the turf with “seed bombs” and planted towering weeping willows and linden trees. Artist Gordon Matta-Clark helped construct La Plaza’s amphitheater using railroad ties and materials reclaimed from abandoned buildings. The fence once featured an art installation by Rolando Politi, a collection of flower-like sculptures made from recycled trash covering the upper part. In February 2019, the garden was closed to replace the fence, which was rusting and falling apart.

The park hosts many community events, recently including gardening workshops, local drag shows, LUNGS events, and film festivals.

To learn more about these and other community gardens in our neighborhoods, check out our East Village Building Block Finder.