Our Story

Apron is a creative community project born out of a need to get together with other people and make something happen; out of the security of putting an apron over your head, tying the strings, and being prepared to paint, craft, build and grow.

Back in 2017 Lis Long, a mother of two young children living in Shoreham-by-Sea, with a background in visual and performing arts and extensive experience working with museums, art galleries and theatres, was working at Hastings Art Gallery, but felt like her local community was missing a gathering space for people to connect, form friendships, and do arts and crafts in alongside their children.

The community space next to the CO-OP in Ham Road became available and Lis asked if she could use the space to run art and craft sessions for anyone who wanted to come along. Drawing on her experience of producing and displaying a diverse range of art works and delivered with support from a growing team of local friends and collaborators, each bringing skill and experience in their creative field, Apron was born and a community was formed.

Fast forward to 2020 and a nation plunged into lockdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Lis who was living in a flat with only a tiny courtyard, realised that her young family, like many other families at the time, had a real need for outdoor space. During her COVID-regulated ‘one walk a day’ Lis would take the same daily route past Buckingham Park, and became aware of a section of the park that had become a dumping ground for building materials. Seeing an opportunity she approached the council and asked if Apron could repurpose this unloved and unused patch of green space as a community garden to grow fruit and vegetables for, and with, Shoreham residents. Having grown up in her grandad’s allotment Lis wanted the same for her children and the local community, essentially an opportunity to get their hands in the soil! To her delight the council awarded Apron the growing space, and along with an enthusiastic group of volunteers, Lis and the Apron community used their collective skills, once regulations were loosened, to prepare the soil, build raised beds, fences, a rain shelter, and plant the seeds and fruit trees.

Stimulated by collaborative working environments and skills sharing, and as an advocate of the self-taught movement Lis believes that accessible education outside of the conventional is something to be celebrated, Apron Community Garden does just that. Today the garden is a thriving green space, that provides local residents, schools, groups, and food banks with fresh, healthy, produce; and true to Apron’s roots, a space to create in nature. In addition to food, Apron offers a programme of events at the Community Garden, from arts and craft, to wellbeing sessions, and our successful annual Shoreham Light Parade.