Holly Lodge

Schools out at the Holly Lodge Centre!

We have just waved goodbye to our last school visitors for this academic year and what a busy year it has been. During 2018-2019 we welcomed a total 8,094 visitors, including 6,404 school children. Our staff and volunteer team worked extremely hard delivering 305 workshops across the year. We have been delighted to work with even more children with disabilities than ever before, with 20 different specialist schools travelling from around London to come and visit us.

Ex-gamekeeper has audience eating out of his hand

Despite being loudly heckled by low-flying ducks, retired Richmond Park gamekeeper John Bartram delivered a fascinating talk recently at WWT London Wetlands.

In conversation with TV presenter Adrian Mills , John had the full attention of a packed auditorium as he described his 30 years living and working in the park.

River Thames art work

Our talented art group for adults with learning difficulties, have spent the past 8 weeks working together to create a huge artwork depicting the River Thames. The piece depicts the river and the green spaces along it. Can you spot the palaces and historic houses in our local area?

Clarendon school children hang out with live bats

We all went completely batty over some very special visitors to the Centre last week. We were joined by the whole of Clarendon Junior School, who came to learn all about bats. The classroom had been converted to a bat cave where the children donned costumes and discovered some stories about bats. Out on the nature trail we used our sensory dipping boxes to explore some more facts about bats, the children hunted for moths and recreated echolocation. The finale was to meet live bats kindly brought to the Centre by Derek from Surrey Bat Trust. We all met two tiny soprano pipistrelle bats, Billy and Benny, who were most obliging and let everyone get up close to have a look at them.

The day was even featured in the Richmond and Twickenham Times, read the article here.

Gold from Richmond Borough in Bloom!

We are thrilled to have once again won a Gold award from Richmond Borough in Bloom.