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Love Lowndes Art Competition – Winners announced

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We are thrilled to announce the winners of the Love Lowndes children’s art competition.

As part of the Valentine’s day ‘Show your LOVE for Lowndes Park’ all-schools Mufti Day the children were encouraged to enter an art competition. They were asked to draw a picture on the theme of “Lowndes Park – the green heart of Chesham”.

We were absolutely bowled over by the number and quality of the entries. Children aged 4 to 11 drew amazing pictures that captured their love of play, their joy of green spaces and their sheer excitement about having a new playground. All the judges commented on how impressed they were and humbled they felt by the care and thought the children had put in. It was a wonderful reminder of why, and for whom, we’re doing this.

Keep reading to find out who the winners are!

Huge thanks to the following schools who raised an amazing £1,255 on the mufti day and/or entered the art competition:

  • Chartridge Combined School
  • Newtown School
  • Waterside Primary Academy
  • Ivingswood Academy
  • Elmtree School (and Nursery)
  • Brushwood Junior School
  • Hawridge and Cholesbury CE School
  • The Beacon School
  • Chesham Preparatory School
  • Thomas Harding Junior School

The Prizes:

WINNERS:
At the entrance to our new playground (due to be built by the end of March 2025), we will have a ‘heroes’ board celebrating all the key sponsors, businesses and groups that have donated to make the new park a reality. On that board we have set aside two spaces for the winning artwork from our two age groups. It will be up in the park for at least 10 years!

RUNNERS UP:
The runners up will be offered the chance to help build the new Bug Hotel in the playground. The build will happen on Sunday 23rd March led by local children’s environmental group Nature Club.

All the winners and runners up will be invited to a VIP play party on the 23rd March where they will be the first children to play in the new playground!

The winners

Age 4-7 category

WINNER

Kaith, Aged 7, Brushwood Junior School

Runners up:

Tia, Aged 5, Chesham Preparatory School

Ayvah, Aged 4, Chesham Preparatory School

Cherry, Aged 6, Hawridge & Cholesbury CE School

 

Age 8-11 Category

WINNER

Matilda, Aged 10, Chartridge Combined School

 

Runners up:

Aanah, Aged 9, Ivingswood Academy

Annabelle, Aged 11, Hawridge & Cholesbury CE School

Vaia, Aged 8, Chesham Preparatory School

 

We cannot overstate how impressed we all were with the entries. Love Lowndes is working on a way to create an exhibition in Chesham to share the amazing work with the community.

All the Ts&Cs in case you’re interested!

The rules:

  • Each entry must be by one child only.
  • It must be drawn on the A4 paper template supplied as the winning images will be square.
  • The child’s name, age and school must be included on the template.
  • Drawings and paintings only – no collage or photographs.
  • The Love Lowndes team will collect all pictures to be submitted at the end of the school day on 14/02/25.
  • The Love Lowndes team will choose two winners:
    • Age 4-7 category
    • Age 8-11s category
  • We will contact the winners to gain approval of the parents for inclusion on the board on Monday 17th February.
  • We will publicly announce the winners by 1st March 2025.
  • The artwork and interpretation board will be unveiled at the new playground grand opening on the 29th March 2025. Winners will be invited to attend.

 

The judging process:

  • All entries were collated by Claire Wyatt (Chair of Love Lowndes) after the deadline of 14/02/2025.
  • Claire sorted the entries into age groupings and delivered them to Louise Hayday (CEO of Chesham Town Council).
  • Louise ‘blind’ judged each age group (only looking at drawings and not names/schools) to create a long-list for each age category.
  • The long-list entries were given back to Claire to redact names and schools details, photograph them and send to a small group from the Love Lowndes committee.
  • This small group then voted for their favourite in each age category and the image with the most votes became the finalist in each age category.
  • Claire then sent the finalists to the full Love Lowndes WhatsApp committee for final judging.
  • The final was judged in the agreed 4-7 age group and the 8-11 age group.
  • There were clear winners in both age groups. Claire Wyatt did not vote at any stage as she was the only one who may have seen names/schools.

 

Love Lowndes: the heroes that made it happen!

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From volunteers to huge grant funders…from local businesses to the children of Chesham – these are the Love Lowndes heroes that made our new 5-11s playground happen!

There’s no doubt that Love Lowndes has been an amazing community success story. Together, we’ve raised £220,000 for Chesham’s new 5-11s playground in Lowndes Park.

Love Lowndes was created by a handful of frustrated residents who came together determined to make improvements to Lowndes Park. So much has been achieved in two short years.

We’ve created the Love Lowndes brand, raised awareness about the dire play facilities, successfully lobbied Chesham Town Council to create a Masterplan for the park, undertaken consultations, engaged and involved the diverse Chesham community, organised lots of events, attended countless fundraisers and written multiple successful grant applications. And the result?

A beautiful new inclusive, accessible, challenging and inspiring destination playground in the green heart of Chesham!

Along the way, the core Love Lowndes team has been supported by various people, organisations and businesses that have turned our dream into a reality.
Thanks and recognition must go to right places. So, below is a list of the heroes of the Love Lowndes story:

The dream team!

The Love Lowndes committee

The core team of Kate Hutchinson, Isabelle Hatfield, Anna Elliott and Claire Wyatt have been the driving force behind Love Lowndes for over two years. They’ve built the brand, attended every meeting, masterminded and delivered every event and strategy, managed communications and social media, written all the funding applications (in collaboration with CTC) and countless other tasks that have created the new playground. It’s been a labour of love and taken so many hours of work. This core team was supported by a wider group of amazing volunteers who’ve provided advice and practical support along the way. Special thanks to Wilford Augustus, Rachael Matthews, Sam Wignall and Sophie Baron.

Chesham Town Council

Love Lowndes has worked alongside CTC from the beginning. They are the owners of Lowndes Park and responsible for its upkeep and development. CTC have provided £35,500 of our budget and supported us in so many ways. They’ve helped with events, administrative support and writing the grant applications. Special mention to Kathryn Graves and Louise Hayday, without whom this would never have happened.

Friends of Lowndes Park

FoLP is a Chesham based voluntary group that created the Lowndes Park Masterplan. This ‘vision’ document has been the template Love Lowndes used as a starting point for the new 5-11s playground. It will be used for all future improvements to the park. FoLP also coordinated the very first meeting of the core team that went on to became Love Lowndes – the fundraising arm of FoLP. They have also provided all the banking services throughout the project.

Our Volunteers

So many people, businesses and organisations have given voluntary support to Love Lowndes. Here they are – in no particular order!

Our fundraisers

Lots of local organisation and residents offered support by running events and finding ingenious ways to raise money for us. Special thanks must go to:

Our Phase 1 Sponsors and Donors

Love Lowndes was the volunteer group responsible for fundraising for the new playground. The project was started with £35,000 from Chesham Town Council. This came from something called CIL money.  The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) is a charge which can be levied by local authorities on new developments in their area. So, when housing or development is done, a levy is charged to the building company and that money must be spent on local infrastructure or improvements.

Love Lowndes successfully applied for a further £500 grant from Chesham Town Council later in the project too.

Over a two-year period, the Love Lowndes volunteers raised an astonishing £49,500! They achieved this by staging events, working with local schools, co-ordinating fundraisers and engaging the local community. They also sourced local corporate sponsorship.

Love Lowndes worked in collaboration with Chesham Town Council to write applications to the grant bodies and secured a further £125,000 for the project (see the pink section in the image below).

Buckinghamshire Council gave £10,000 a succesful application to the Chesham and Villages Community Board.

Phase 1 of our playground renovation and improvement is the 5-11s playground. It was made possible thanks to all the amazing people who donated to our Crowdfunder and because of the incredible support from following organisations:

And we are indebted to our amazing local sponsors:

Platinum:

Gold:

Silver:

The following businesses/groups also donated:

Plus, of course, everyone who donated to the Crowdfunder or who signed up to Easy Fundraising.

I hope you agree this list of the volunteers, sponsors, fundraisers, funders and all-round heroes responsible for making Love Lowndes a success is heart-warming to read.

But, there’s more!

Yep, that’s right. Even though the Love Lowndes team would like nothing more than to down-tools and have a well-deserved rest, we’re hungry for more!

Phase 2 of the playground renovation is already underway.

We’re fundraising to replace and renew the 0-4s playground (inside the hedge), replace the zipwire and add some natural scramble play equipment at the top of the park.

As ever, you can donate via the Crowdfunder and get involved by emailing lovelowndes@gmail.com. They really need more volunteers!!

 

FAQs – all you need to know about the new 5-11s playground

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We’re sure you have a lot of questions about the new 5-11s playground in Lowndes Park. We’ve tried to anticipate these and hope this article tells you all you need to know.

Why did we need a new playground?

By the end of 2024 much of the play equipment designed for 5-11 year olds had been removed from the park for safety reasons. The remaining equipment (in the hedged area) was better suited to younger children. The other aging and broken play equipment was spread over the park in no coherent way.

Lowndes Park is the green heart of Chesham and so we decided we needed a play space that was accessible, inclusive, challenging, creative and inspiring.  We wanted to create a space that fitted in with the beautiful park and reflected our culture and heritage.

The children of Chesham now have a modern, accessible, free-of-charge and safe play space in our town’s flagship park. It will encourage imaginative play, look after their physical and mental wellbeing and enable communities to come together. We have also invested in a design that tells the story of Chesham and included elements like the Local History board.

What age group does it serve, and will it be inclusive?

The new playground is designed for children aged 5 to 11. It has been designed to be inclusive and accessible with good paths and a range of equipment to suit different ages, play styles and physical abilities. It is suitable for 90+ users, has 100+ play values and over 45 inclusive play opportunities.

We are currently fundraising for a new 0-4s playground (to replace the existing one inside the hedged area) and raising funds to replace the zip-wire. We also have plans to install a natural scramble and climb zone at the top of the park. The social swings with the park are great for teenagers. But we do hope to provide more opportunities for teens in the future.

Who designed and installed it?

We chose Proludic as our designer and supplier. There was a thorough and transparent tender process managed by Chesham Town Council. Proludic were chosen by the project team and the Council as the best supplier. They had a clear vision for the playground that not only delivered great play value, but also felt in-keeping with Lowndes Park and incorporated the history and story of our town. We were also impressed by their sustainability performance.

How did you decide on the equipment?

We conducted extensive research and consultations so we had a good idea of what the Chesham community wanted from their new playground. The design and equipment choices were based on these. We also took advice from Proludic to make sure we were getting a good range of equipment to suit different needs, ages and styles of play. The 4metre high multi-play unit is a bespoke design for us in Lowndes Park. It has a range of challenging ways for children to interact with it and play. We also wanted to include inclusive and accessible elements like the see-saw, trampoline and roundabout.

Will it be muddy in the winter?

We hope not! We’ve invested in wonderful new bonded gravel paths, high-quality wet-pour sprung surfacing around the main multi-play area and swings and grass matting under all other play elements.

Why isn’t it fenced?

After consultation with Proludic, we decided that our budget was better spent on play services. Fencing is a huge expense and mainly used in playgrounds for younger children or near traffic.

How much did it cost?

The final budget was £220,000.

We smashed our original target of £150K! Raising the extra money has enabled us to build a much better playground with more inclusive elements and larger, more challenging play equipment.

I know the number is eye-watering. But we opted for quality equipment and invested in more paths and larger areas of rubber flooring to be accessible to all and to make sure that the area doesn’t get waterlogged and muddy.

Where did the money come from?

Love Lowndes was the volunteer group responsible for fundraising for the new playground. The project was started with £35,000 from Chesham Town Council. This came from something called CIL money.  The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) is a charge which can be levied by local authorities on new developments in their area. So, when housing or development is done, a levy is charged to the building company and that money must be spent on local infrastructure or improvements.

Love Lowndes successfully applied for a further £500 grant from Chesham Town Council later in the project too.

Over a two-year period, the Love Lowndes volunteers raised an astonishing £49,500! They achieved this by staging events, working with local schools, co-ordinating fundraisers and engaging the local community. They also sourced local corporate sponsorship.

Love Lowndes worked in collaboration with Chesham Town Council to write applications to the grant bodies and secured a further £125,000 for the project (see the pink section in the image below).

Buckinghamshire Council gave £10,000 after a successful application to the Chesham and Villages Community Board.

You can see a full list of all the Heroes who made our project happen here.

Our Phase 1 Sponsors and Donors

Phase 1 of our playground renovation and improvement is the 5-11s playground. It was made possible thanks to all the amazing people who donated to our Crowdfunder and because of the incredible support from following organisations:

And we are indebted to our amazing local sponsors:

Platinum:

Gold:

Silver:

The following businesses/groups also donated:

Plus, of course, everyone who donated to the Crowdfunder or who signed up to Easy Fundraising.

Why didn’t the Council fund the new play park in full?

Chesham Town Council are committed to ensuring that the existing facilities at Lowndes Park can continue to be used and enjoyed by local residents. They contributed £35,500 to the new playground and they have had two permanent staff members on the Love Lowndes committee since its inception. Sadly local Government funding isn’t enough to cover the costs of new playgrounds so Love Lowndes was created to help find the extra money.

Buckinghamshire Council contributed £10,000 via the Community Board.

Who is responsible for ongoing care and maintenance?

Chesham Town Council owns Lowndes Park and they are responsible for maintenance of the play facilities.

The Friends of Lowndes Park (FOLP) is a local voluntary community group that represents the people who use the park. The aim of FOLP is to ensure the park is well cared for, maintained, and has a planned and healthy future. Love Lowndes is a FOLP fundraising project. Love Lowndes are continuing to raise money for Phase 2 of the park improvements – the new 0-4s playground, nature scramble zone and replacement of the zip wire.

Proludic, the playground designer and supplier, guarantees the equipment for roughly 20 years.

  • Lifetime warranty on panels (coloured compact/high density polyethylene non-slip compact), posts and supporting structures (painted galvanised steel, galvanised steel, stainless
    steel) and stainless steel tubes.
  • 25 years on lacquered plywood panels and non-slip plywood panels.
  • 15 years on Robina Wood
  • 10 years for springs and mechanical systems and moulded or rotary moulded plastic parts (with the exception of moving parts).
  • 5 years for springs and mechanical systems and moulded or rotary moulded plastic parts (with the exception of moving parts).
  • 2 years for any defect or manufacturing fault of component parts

They have also included a half day maintenance training session for CTC staff and a bespoke spares box including spares, caps, collars & shackles worth £250.

Why can’t we have a splash park?

We’ve looked in great detail into this. Our park has some unique challenges like the geese. We’re also not a large park with very few flat surfaces. It’s hard to accommodate all desired facilities in Lowndes Park’s small and challenging footprint. A rough guide for the installation of a splash park is £300k. And the ongoing annual management and maintenance is at least £50k pa. It’s not feasible for the Council.

Will you replace the Zip Line?

Yes! Fundraising has already started. We plan to replace the zip line (and re-site it closer to the new 5-11s playground) and also create a new 0-4s playground.

Have you thought about the environment and sustainability?

This was a key part of our design process. We liaised with various bodies while fundraising to make sure we thought about the impact the new playground would have.

  • The new playground works with the existing topography to reduce ground disturbance
  • We designed the playground around established trees
  • We’ve added 2 new tress plus a pollinator rich planting scheme in the beds and borders
  • We’ve installed a bug hotel.
  • Proludic have ISO14001 certification and are also donating a Carbon offset investment to ensure a carbon-neutral delivery of the project
  • 99% of the products included in the new park contain recyclable materials
  • We have installed 3 wooden bird boxes & 3 wooden bat boxes

Buy a Legacy Brick from Love Lowndes and help us pave the way for play!

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Cement your place in Lowndes Park history.

BUY NOW

Our fundraising group Love Lowndes has been doing an outstanding job raising funds for the new 5-11s playground in Lowndes Park. They’ve hatched a rather lovely plan to sell engraved bricks and lay a special path in the park. Buy a personalised legacy brick and pave the way for play.

Each step on the ‘path to play’ will hold the names of individuals and businesses that have supported this incredible community playground project.

Perhaps you’d like a brick for each of your children, grandchildren or in memory of a loved one who loved our park? Or maybe you’d like your family name immortalised in the park for years to come.

How does it work?

  • Go to the Love Lowndes Crowdfunder page and look for the Rewards section (on the right hand side on desktop or click the Rewards tab on mobile).
  • Choose from:
    • A single Legacy brick for £75
    • Two bricks for £100
    • A Business Legacy Brick for £125
  • After purchase, Love Lowndes will email you a form to fill in with your chosen text.
  • Each brick will have a maximum of 2 lines of text, each with a 16 character limit.
BUY NOW

Love Lowndes welcomes Silverson and The Entertainer as its Platinum Corporate Supporters

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It’s a big month for news this September, we are delighted to announce that we have secured two of our three Love Lowndes Platinum Corporate Sponsors – Silverson and The Entertainer.

Thanks to their generous support, combined with the money raised within the Community and from our successful grant applications, such as the recent £75,000 from the Veolia Environmental Trust, we can now confidently say that we have reached our minimum fundraising target of £150,000 towards a new playground for 5-11 year olds in Lowndes Park, Chesham.

This means that there will be a new playground for the children of Chesham, and we can confirm that steps have already been taken to move ahead with the playground design so that it is ready to build during the first half of 2025.

Speaking about their sponsorship…

“Silverson have been based in Chesham for more than 50 years and with many of our staff living in the local area it is important to us to support the local community. We are pleased to be able to support Love Lowndes with fundraising for a new playground in Lowndes Park that will benefit the child of the town ad other members of the community for years to come.”

Gary Grant, Founder of The Entertainer, said:

“We’re delighted to sponsor the Lowndes Park project – which is creating such a fantastic opportunity for families in Chesham.

At The Entertainer, we believe all children should have access to somewhere safe to play and we’re happy to help fund the fun and support such an important local cause.”

 

Claire Wyatt, Chair of Love Lowndes, commented…

“We have been bowled over by the support of Chesham’s community. It’s amazing to have The Entertainer and Silverson joining us as Platinum Sponsors. These generous local businesses are enabling us to create a vital free resource for our children. Supporting Love Lowndes in this way leaves a lasting legacy; one that won’t be forgotten.”

 

It’s not too late to help!

Whilst we may have reached our minimum fundraising target, it isn’t too late to show your support and donate to Love Lowndes. All additional funds we receive above the £150,000 already raised will allow us to build an even bigger, more accessible, inclusive and sustainable playground for the families of Chesham. We know that there are local flagship playgrounds, which many of our community travel to due to the poor offering in Chesham, that cost over £200,000. We want the same for our children. So, there are plenty of extra elements in our wish list that need funding.

To any local businesses interested, we may have secured our Platinum Sponsors, but there are still opportunities to sign up for Gold, Silver and Bronze level corporate sponsorship for the next few weeks. Please read our Love Lowndes Sponsorship Proposal. By choosing to support Love Lowndes, your logo will be featured in the playground on our honours board or a bench for a minimum of 10 years!

Advertise-Love-Lowndes

For our local community, we have asked so much from you and will forever be grateful for your incredible support to turn our dreams of a new playground in the heart of Chesham into reality. We have one final fundraising activity up our sleeves, look out for an announcement from us next month which will offer members of the local community a very special and unique way to be a part of the new playground in Lowndes Park.

Love-Lowndes-platinum-sponsor

 

 

 

 

 

 

Massive grant to Love Lowndes makes park dreams a reality!

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We have some amazing news to share.

The Love Lowndes team has just found out that their application to the Veolia Environmental Trust has been successful!

Veolia is supporting the new playground project with a whopping £75,000 grant – the full amount applied for.

Love Lowndes is our voluntary community group dedicated to raising enough money to build a new playground in Lowndes Park. You can read more about them on our project page.

Claire Wyatt, Chair of Love Lowndes, says “We are absolutely over the moon! We are a very small team of volunteers who have worked tirelessly to raise the money needed for a new playground in Lowndes Park. This news takes us a step closer to building the inclusive, exciting and destination playground we dream of for the children of Chesham.”

Months of hard work went into the application process. Special mention must go to Isabelle Hatfield, who leads the grant funding application work for Love Lowndes, and Kathryn Graves (the Community, Economy & Environment Manager at Chesham Town Council)who has also worked incredibly hard on the application and committed many ‘out of work’ hours to making Love Lowndes the success it is.

There was also a special meeting of local environmental experts who helped with an important element of the application process. So, thanks must also be sent to Cllr. Justine Fulford, Trevor Brawn and Laura Silverstone for contributing their knowledge and time.

The Veolia Environmental Trust uses money to support community and environmental projects through the Landfill Communities Fund (LCF). The LCF is a tax credit scheme designed to compensate for the negative impacts of landfill sites on surrounding communities and the environment. Under the Scheme, landfill operators like Veolia are required to allocate a portion of their Landfill Tax liability to not-for-profit organisations to support various initiatives such as environmental conservation, improvements to community infrastructure, and recreational projects, all aimed at improving the quality of life and environment in areas adjacent to landfill sites.

I think we can all agree that their contribution will make a massive difference to our project.

Love Lowndes is still actively fundraising.

Advertise-Love-Lowndes
Over the last 18 months, the Love Lowndes team has raised nearly £55,000 via events like the Pumpkin Parade, hosting comedy nights at the Elgiva Theatre and engaging the wider community through with various fundraising endeavours.

The Chesham community is at the heart of Love Lowndes’ success. A key part of the funding application to Veolia was proving that Love Lowndes is supported and endorsed by local people and businesses.

But their work isn’t done!

“Playgrounds are wildly expensive” continues Wyatt, “Building work is due to start in the early Spring but in order to deliver the best possible park for our children, we must keep going. We are actively seeking business sponsors to take up advertising opportunities in the park and we’ll also be doing a ‘buy a brick’ scheme for a path in the new playground just before Christmas – please help and watch this space!”

If you’re interested in becoming a Sponsor of Love Lowndes, please contact Claire on lovelowndes@gmail.com

To make a donation, please visit the Love Lowndes Crowdfunder page.

Children of Chesham raise £3804 towards a new playground in Lowndes Park

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A HUGE thank you to the schools in Chesham for raising £3804 towards the new playground in Lowndes Park.

On 12th February, many of the schools across Chesham took part in a mufti day by wearing ‘Something Colourful’ in aid of Love Lowndes. It was a wonderful community initiative which involved over 2000 children and was spearheaded by Nuno Alexandre, Headteacher of Chartridge Combined School. We think that this is the first time that the local schools have come together for an inter-school mufti day to raise funds and awareness for a community project.

Speaking about the initiative, Mr Alexandre said:

“ We were incredibly proud to take part in the ‘Fund the Fun’ non-uniform day. It was wonderful to witness the participation of numerous schools in Chesham and the surrounding areas. The children have shown such enthusiasm and dedication towards this project, which aims to raise funds for the development of the playpark at Lowndes Park. I would like to extend our appreciation to all the volunteers at Love Lowndes for leading such a commendable initiative that showcases the unity and support within our local area. The children of Chesham will benefit hugely from the enhancements to the park which will become an even greater asset to our wonderful community.”

Claire Wyatt, Project Leader of Love Lowndes said:

“Wow, we’ve been blown away by the response to the mufti day! Seeing so many schools and children come together to support us has been amazing; and we’ve raised way more than we could have dreamed. Such engagement really helps with our grant fund applications. And it also sends a powerful message to our County and Town Councils that the park is loved and that our community desperately want a new playground.”

As well as wearing colourful clothes for the day, some of the children contributed to the campaign by designing their dream playground! Some of these can be seen below. Watch this Facebook video of the pupils at Brushwood Junior School telling us what they would like to see in the new playground! We very much look forward to working with the schools again on this project in the future.

Thank you to the following schools for taking part, and the generous donations from the parents:

  • Brushwood Junior School
  • Chartridge Combined School
  • Chesham Prep School
  • Elmtree Infant & Nursery School
  • Hawridge and Cholesbury Church of England School
  • Heritage House School
  • Ivingswood Academy
  • Ley Hill School
  • Newtown School
  • Our Lady’s Catholic Primary School
  • Waterside Primary Academy

A few comments from parents who contributed:

“Wonderful colourful idea in drab January to involve the children in a fantastic project” Lorna Barnes, local parent via Crowdfunder

“Fab Initiative! Lowndes is such a lovely park and local kids deserve a nice, safe place to play” Lucy Clark – local parent via Crowdfunder

“We Love Lowndes and cannot wait for this new playground for our son and all children to enjoy!” Jonida Andoni – local parent via Crowdfunder

“We have such a beautiful park in Chesham and it deserves all the love and attention to bring it up to date. Big thanks to everyone who’s making this happen and for giving our kids a new amazing park they can enjoy for many years to come.” Sabrina Norris, local parent via Crowdfunder

 

Love Lowndes is a volunteer group in Chesham who is working with Chesham Town Council and Friends of Lowndes Park to raise over £150k to build a new playground in Lowndes Park, Chesham. The current playground is worn out, inaccessible and badly designed, the children of Chesham deserve so much better! Chesham Town Council has created an ambitious masterplan for Lowndes Park, the funds raised by Love Lowndes will contribute to the first phase of the plan, to create a new, exciting and accessible play area for the children of Chesham.

So far we have raised £50,000 towards the new playground.

Find out more about the campaign, and donate via our Love Lowndes Crowdfunder website. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram or X and watch our campaign video.

If you have been inspired to run your own fundraising event to raise money for Love Lowndes, or wish to ask us any questions about the campaign, please email us at lovelowndes@gmail.com

 

Love Lowndes – an end of year update

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Love Lowndes – the story so far!

Wow! Well, what a year it’s been!

As we head towards the end of the year it felt the right time to reflect on all the great things we’ve achieved so far with Love Lowndes.

We’re well on our way to our target:

So far we’ve raised just over £44,500!

Here’s a little roundup of our activities and the amazing progress we’ve made towards our target of building a brand new, accessible destination playground in Lowndes Park, Chesham.

January 2023

The year kicked off with us officially forming as a group. We were born out of a Chesham Town Council open meeting about the state of Lowndes Park. A few of us decided we needed a special group just to focus on the play equipment as it seemed, to us, to be the number one priority.

February 2023

Endless planning and research! We knew we had a mammoth task ahead of us so wanted to have a strategic approach. We decided the summer and autumn would be all about events and engaging with the people of Chesham. Behind the scenes we’d be researching large grant funds and coordinating our corporate sponsorship offer. Timing us everything! We discovered that many grant funds have strict rules about how quickly you need to build after they give you the donation. So, we decided to hold off applications until we’d raised some money ourselves.

March/ April 2023

We pursued the idea of a Lowndes Park Masterplan. We knew it would be crazy to raise the money for a new playground and just plonk it somewhere in our already muddled park. The team at the Friends of Lowndes Park successfully lobbied the Council and helped find the funds for a professional Masterplan to be created.

That way, any playground we create would sit harmoniously within a park that has a strategic vision for the next 100 years.

We commissioned local photographers to capture the park in all it’s glory and to document the problems. This would help with our marketing, fundraising and grant applications. Huge thanks to Middleton Man and Matt Writtle.

May 2023

We decided on our name and commissioned logos from the amazing Claire Vickers. We set up our Crowdfunder and arranged all our social media profiles.

We made contact with Chesham’s Mayor for 2023-2024 Wilford Augustus. He agreed to make us one of his main charitable organisations for all his fundraising effort whilst Mayor.

June 2023

Love Lowndes was officially launched at the Schools of Chesham Carnival. With the help of Claire Vickers who created our logo, Hello Designs who made our flyer, and SignX graphics who printed and donated the two large vinyls and the pop-up banner. It was wonderful to finally meet the people of Chesham and hear stories of how desperate they are for a new playground.

July 2023

We took a stand at the Hats Off festival. It was great to connect with the people of Chesham again.

August and September 2023

Clocktober Fest – huge thanks to Trekkers Bar for making us their charity partners. It was great to see so many people engaging with our message and donations flooding in.

October 2023

Our autumn season of events were a huge success. Our afternoon kids’ comedy show with the Noise Next Door raised the roof (and a lot of cash!) and the evening Stand-Up for Love Lowndes show was a near sell-out. On a single day we raised just over £5,000! Huge thanks again to Mark Rann, Toby Friedner, Alex Horne and all the acts for making it happen.

The Pumpkin Parade was a magical moment in the park – with calls for it to become an annual community event! It was swiftly followed by an adorable afternoon back the Elgiva for a screening of Spookley the Square Pumpkin. Both events had a huge turnout.

We were thrilled that My Marvellous Monster created a bespoke piece of art for our Pumpkin Parade and auctioned it for us and so grateful to The Rocket Oven who gave all their profits from the food they sold at the Pumpkin Parade to Love Lowndes. Thank you also to local amateur photographers Alex Martin and Darren Cooper for capturing the event so perfectly on film.

Check out the Bucks Free Press article about it.

November 2023

Our film is now live! You can see it at the top of the page and on YouTube. Massive thanks to Candice Channing-Williams and her friends and family for coordinating the shoot and Andy Turvey for editing. And thanks of course to all the people who spoke to us and gave their thoughts – even if you didn’t make the cut, your help was invaluable. This film will help promote us and explain the huge case for action we have to our grant bodies we’re applying to.

November also saw the release of the Lowndes Park Masterplan document. We now know the new playground will be placed within a coherent plan for the whole park.

So, now what?

Well, we’re taking a brief Christmas break from big events to focus on family and work – we’re all volunteers after all!

But work is still going on behind the scenes on Grant Applications, Corporate Sponsorship and fundraising plans for 2024.

And we’re thrilled to be working with the majority of the infant and primary schools across Chesham on a Mufti Day in January. The children will be encouraged to come to school dressed in colourful clothes and donate money to our cause. Special thanks to Mr Alexandre, Headteacher at Chartridge Combined School for coordinating all the schools for us.

For now, And you can still help by donating to our Crowdfunder, or buying the Chesham Calendar from JPS Stationers, and using Easy Fundraising to donate for FREE whilst your doing all your Christmas shopping.

And Wilford Augustus, Chesham’s Mayor, has made us one of his main charities and has run many events so far with more to come.

So far we’ve raised just over £44,500. We have a long way to go, but we’re confident we’ll get there.

Heartfelt thanks to everyone who’s helped us on the journey so far. Whether that be donation, attending an event, helping us, donating their time or skills or simply spreading the word – we couldn’t do it without you.

Watch this space!

Pumpkin Parade

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Light up Lowndes Park this autumn!

Will your pumpkin be crowned the best in Chesham?

28th October
4:30pm – 6:30pm
Lowndes Park

Family event, all ages welcome!

Free to attend*

Pumpkin Parade Cheshm

Come and celebrate the wonder and glory of autumn as we light up Lowndes Park with pumpkins at sunset!

Love Lowndes continue to fundraise for the new playground in our beautiful park.

The Pumpkin Parade is an FREE event* that celebrates the wonder and glory of autumn. With fancy dress competitions, seasonal fete games, great food and the main avenue being lit up by Chesham’s pumpkins at sunset; it’s set to be a magical, inclusive afternoon in the green heart of Chesham.

A few highlights:

 

*Items marked with a * will require payment.

How it works

PUMPKIN CARVING

  1. Pre-booking has now ended. Please come along to the event between 4:30 and 5:30pm and pay for your entry at the Love Lowndes stand.
  2. PRE-CARVE your pumpkin and bring it to the event. Do not bring a tea-light (we will provide these). No naked flames please!
  3. Come to the main Love Lowndes stand (near the George V shelter just by the performance space) at the event between 4:30 and 5:30pm where you be given your entry token, a free LED tea-light, your pre-booking bonus gift (if applicable) and instructions on where to place your pumpkin.
  4. Judging is at 5.30pm.
  5. 6:15 pm Winners announced and prizes given.

FANCY DRESS

  1. Pre-booking has now ended. Please come along to the event between 4:30 and 5:30pm and pay for your entry at the Love Lowndes stand.
  2. Dress in your best Halloween or Autumn themed costumes.
  3. Come to the main Love Lowndes stand (near the George V shelter just by the performance space) at the event between 4:30 and 5:30pm where you be given your entry token.
  4. All entrants will be asked to gather in the performance space in Lowndes Park as 6:00pm where judging will take place.
  5. 6:15pm Winners announced and prizes given.

All competitions will be divided into age groups so that everyone can join in the fun!

Category One: 0-7s
Category Two: 8-15
Category Three: 16+

Find out more info  here.

The Rocket Oven

rocket-oven The Rocket Oven is a Chesham business. It’s a beautiful Airstream style trailer which is run by husband and wife team, George and Tori. The concept is born from the pandemic, a love of good food and wanting to work together to share our passion.

Our food ethos is simple: fresh, local and honest. These principles are the key ingredients to everything we make! We specialise in making flatbreads which are stuffed with anything from herbed falafel, tzatziki and sumac onions to slow roasted shoulder of lamb gyros with a roasted garlic mayonnaise.

 

 

*Entry to the event is free to all. The dream web and crafts activities are also free. The competitions and some games will be chargeable as we’re running this event to raise some money for the new playground.  

More seasonal fun

And if the Pumpkin Parade has just whetted your appetite for all things orange, autumnal and just a little bit Halloween, then we’ve got another treat for you.

The Elgiva theatre are screening Spookley the Square Pumpkin on the 29th October at 2pm as part of the On Location Film Festival. All proceeds go to Love Lowndes.

This family-friendly film will be a lovely treat for the little ones.

In a world where the only good pumpkins are round pumpkins, Spookley the Square Pumpkin is often teased because of his shape.

But when a storm terrorizes his patch, a pumpkin cast out for his shape must step up to use his smarts to save the day – and to prove himself.

 

Stand Up for Love Lowndes – Comedy Fundraiser

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Taskmaster’s Alex Horne is your MC for a night of world class comedy – all in aid of Love Lowndes – funding Chesham’s new playground.

Headliners: The Noise Next Door.

1st October, 7pm. Elgiva Theatre, Chesham

The funniest show you will see all year…made up on the spot! These guys have spent the last 15 years perfecting the art of winging it. Watch in amazement as they take audience suggestions and transform them into genuinely hilarious sketches and songs in the blink of an eye.

The Noise next Door are 12 time sell-out veterans of The Edinburgh Fringe and have appeared on The One Show (BBC One), Britain’s Got Talent (ITV1) and have also appeared alongside the likes of Michael McIntyre, Katherine Ryan and Harry Hill.

Coordinated by Chesham hero Mark Rann of Chesham Comedy Club. More acts to be announced soon.
Don’t miss your chance to ‘laugh out loud’ for Lowndes Park.

“Hilarious…a superior kind of chaos.” Telegraph
“Comedy Gold.” Guardian
“21st century comedy at it’s finest and funniest.” The Stage

Age suggestion 15+

Book now at The Elgiva Theatre, Chesham.

www.crowdfunder.co.uk/love-lowndes