‘Edible graves’ bring new life

An overgrown church graveyard in West Yorkshire has been transformed into a community garden, replete with orchard and pond – and ‘edible graves’.

A small congregation, Morley Community Church, was gifted a redundant building, adjacent to the main shopping street, in 2021 with a large graveyard, many graves more than a century old. Andy Dalton, the church’s secretary, said it had become ‘an eyesore and a maintenance nightmare’.

For two years, volunteers cleared the vegetation and dug it over; 21 old kerb-stoned graves became ready-built raised beds planted with vegetables, herbs and flowering plants – with more planned.