Finchley Horticultural Society was founded in 1940 as The West Finchley (Wartime) Allotments Association, part of the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign.

 In 1948 the wartime restrictions were lifted and the amount of land requisitioned for food growing dropped dramatically, but at Gordon Road and Nethercourt Avenue it was retained as statutory allotment land, leased to the Society by Finchley Urban District Council (now London Borough of Barnet).  Over the following years home gardeners were also welcomed to the Society and ‘West’ was removed from the title.  In 1967 Finchley Horticultural Society became our official name.  We adopted a new constitution in 2011.

 The Society held its first show in 1940, in a war time shelter on one trestle table at Windsor Open Space.

 Shows went on to become a very important activity for the Society. In 1973 there were 578 entries. Sadly support gradually dwindled and the FHS Shows ceased in 2000.  We held our first Plant Sale (in Events) in 1980.  Today this is a major local event with a huge range of plants all grown on site.

 Bulk horticultural supplies for resale to members and plotholders were bought by the Society from the beginning.  A trading hut was run from an Anderson shelter at Gordon Road soon after the war – subsequently a garage (1980) and a substantial hut (1984) were erected here.  The Nethercourt hut was purchased in 1972.

 In 1973 the Society hosted the 1,082^nd edition of the BBC’s Gardener’s Question Time .  The first edition of our expanded newsletter ‘The Grapevine’ was produced in Spring 2011.  Sixteen raised beds for disabled gardeners and schools were opened at Gordon Road by the Mayor of Barnet in June 2012. From 2013 our allotment sites are leased from the Council on a self-management basis for a 38 year period.   Brent Way allotments came under the management of the Society in 2013.

The Finchley Horticultural Society is affiliated to the Royal Horticultural Society The National Society of Allotment and Leisure Gardens, The Federation of Middlesex Horticultural and Allotment Societies, and the Barnet Federation of Allotments

Finchley Horticultural Society

34 Elm Park Road, London N3 1EB

email: finchleyhorticulturalsociety@gmail.com