Overview
Open Tuesday to Friday 10am - 3pm
We offer a therapeutic service, based on the Ecotherapy or Green Care model of wellbeing. By getting outside and working on woodland management, conservation and coppice craft activities in our beautiful 43-acre ancient woodland, our Verderers find their emotional, cognitive and physical health improves.
Our participants (Verderers) come to us with a range of Mental Health, Neurological and Learning Disability support needs. Some just feel low and want time out following redundancy or a bereavement.
Built on valued activity—Ecotherapy in action
Our schemes are designed to help the individual live happier and healthier through improving green spaces for the wider community and creating products from resources created by the woodland. This work is meaningful and develops a variety of life skills in our participants:
- Cognitive skills such as problem solving and decision making
- Builds physical and mental resilience and fitness through physical activities in a natural, outdoor space
- Social interaction, team work and confidence
- Improves feelings of wellbeing through reduction in stress and developing managing strategies
- Improves self-esteem through regular feedback on developing craft or work-tolerance skills
Contact
Sessions are planned around individual need and use woodland management to help you develop resilience and self-confidence so that you can better manage your mental health.
You will learn how to manage the seasonal needs of the woodland and make the most of its resources. One day you may be mowing, coppicing and clearing invasive species using basic hand tools. Another you may be chopping fire wood with a hand axe; making a knife at our on-site forge or making and carving a stool using carpentry techniques and a pole lathe.
We will work with you and your health care practitioner if you have one, so that you can achieve your goals – whether that is to get back into work or just feel better able to cope with life.
Sessions are £50 per day (10am-3pm), which can be paid privately or by personal budgets through health or social care funding. You can do up to four days per week, which you can refer yourself to or get a referral from your healthcare team. To see if this programme is suitable you can have two free taster days.
Costs
| Description | Cost type | Unit price | Cost unit |
|---|---|---|---|
| £60 |
Referral
Participants can refer themselves, by relatives or health care professionals.
Inclusion
Supporting
- Other