Which herb best represents Dursley?
It’s nearly time for the Herbal Takeover (Saturday 19th July), and as part of our full herbilicious day, we get to debate and decide on the best herb to represent our town – and ‘we’ includes you.
Spoilt for choice
We are blessed to live in a space surrounded by plants. They’re so much part of our every day, we can almost not realise they’re there.
Like the fish who was asked ‘How’s the water?’ and was puzzled by the question, never having even thought about the water he existed within.
Sometimes it takes leaving a place to notice what’s there all the time. When you return it seems greener, nicer somehow than when you left. Have you ever had that experience of being away in a city and calling back home, the birdsong in the background seems so much louder when you’re remote from it and hear it down the phone?
So perhaps it’s not surprising that the plants surrounding us are just stuff we walk past each day.
Cotswold Herb Centre
Cotswold Herb Centre was founded to help make that every day stuff special. To share the prompts and stories that mean we start to recognise our local plants, to know their seasons and their reasons.
Once you get to know them, you find so many plants have interesting stories to share. And many of them have truly practical uses – the purposeful plants that we particularly look out for on our herb walks.
They also tell us a lot about ourselves, our history, the way people have lived and worked in this place over the centuries. There are some plants that are more intimately linked with our stories than others. Either they’ve prospered because of us, or we’ve prospered because of them. These are the kind of stories we’re drawing out in finding our Herb for Dursley.
The Nominations are in
We’ve put the call through the Cotswold Herb Centre newsletter, and various local meetings, to ask for herby nominations, plants that you think have a good story to tell about our people, place and history.
Excitingly, six have made the grade, each brings a unique perspective on an element of Dursley: past, present, or future.
Would you like to know what they are?
Come along to the Herbal Takeover on 19th July to find out!
Time to vote
The Herb for Dursley debate will start at 6pm and each of the six herbs will have a micro six minute pitch. Time to convince you that they are the best herb to represent the town.
- They need to be part of Dursley’s local story (no hothouse flowers)
- They need to appeal to lots of people (no garden menaces)
- They need to be plentiful in our local area (no scarce orchids)
- They need to look distinctive, recognisable (no shrinking violets)
- They need to get your vote!
Support your local herb
So come along to The Engine (Silver Street) on Saturday 19th July. We’ll be there all day, from 10am. Drop in at any time for herby chat and activities. And do sign up to join one of the workshops.
After our day of workshops and activity, the debate will start at 6pm with the micro pitches, followed by the vote. Look forward to seeing you there.
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