Granville Community Farm Hub
What is Granville Community Farm Hub?
We are a productive peri-urban farm hub connected to our South Kilburn community through a series of food related activities, educational programmes and distribution routes.
People Behind the Farm Hub
The Granville Community Farm Hub brings together a core team and a wider network of people who contribute their expertise, experience and knowledge. Together, they help guide the project’s development.
Core Team
Beni (They, them)
“I want this project to be an example of a different type of food system, one that feeds everyone decent food, creates livelihoods and does this without negatively impacting the environment. I hope that the farm hub inspires generations to come, and shows the power of people coming together and dreaming big. I’m excited to plant trees, to dig ponds, to grow and eat vegetables, and to hear screams of laughter over the hills. And I can’t wait to do it with all of you!”
Focus area
Business plan & Site
Jo (She, her)
“The main thing you should know about me is that I love veg and people! Over the past 10 years, I have been working outside of the UK with people facing different challenges to cover what they need to live as a result of sudden or protracted crises. At the heart of this has been food. This has led me to spend a lot of time with farmers and food producers, from goat herders to yogurt makers! Inspired by those that work with nature to feed us all, I have turned my hands to the soil to grow vegetables and work with communities to create local and more sustainable food systems that are in harmony with our planet.”
Focus area
Enabling activities
Calum (He, him)
“When did you last bury your hands in the cool, dark soil? When did you last pick the sweet fruit of the seeds you planted months before? When did you last take a breathe of air that’s only filled with the sounds of birds, bees and the rustling of the wind? Our connection to the lands that feed us, water us and hold us is more important than we realise and the Farm Hub is a chance to remember and feel again, that we are a part of this Earth – powerful, deep, resilient and full of life and creation”
Focus area
Governance
Capri (She, her)
“Who doesn’t love fresh organic vegetables straight from the soil? Who can say no to tying fresh tomato stems to their supports and watching them grow bigger with love and hope? And who wouldn’t enjoy a cup of fresh mint tea, a good chat and a rest in the polytunnel after an afternoon working on the land?
For me, the Farm Hub is where food, people and land get a little tangled up together — in the best possible way. It’s a mixture of sweat, soil, chit-chat and giggles. Happy stomach, happy heart!”
Focus area
Communications & Community engagement
Advisory Group
Zahra Dalilah is a Black feminist, made in Lewisham. Her writing, facilitation and activism are all pathways towards manifesting futures rooted in laughter, play and collective liberation. She cut her teeth organising with a magical collective called Take Back the CIty back in 2015 and co-founded an organisation called Kinfolk Network soon after. She has been active in the global philanthropic space for eight years. She is always down to move money and power away from the existing concentrations of wealth in order to make organising for liberation more easeful for movement actors. She has extensive experience as a facilitator and coach working on collective culture building, navigating group dynamics, and organisational development. She keeps a focus on Black liberation and climate justice in her own activism most recently collaborating with organisations such as Decolonising Economics and Reel News.
Will is the Senior Associate for Food and Farming at the Global Strategic Communications Council, leading initiatives that advance agroecological practices and promote fairness across food supply chains. With extensive experience managing vineyards and implementing regenerative farming methods across Europe, he combines practical agricultural knowledge with a deep commitment to nature-friendly farming. Will has also previously worked on issues surrounding food poverty, having coordinated food bank campaigns in Bristol and Manchester.
He holds degrees from the University of Bristol, Institut Agro Montpellier, and The Agronomic Institute of Lisbon. Will is also a contributing columnist for WickedLeaks, exploring the intersections of food, farming, ecology, and fairness.
Helen is the Co-founder & Co-ordinator of Kindling Trust and Kindling Farm. She co-founded Kindling in 2007 from a background in grassroots environmental and community activism. She was instrumental in raising £4 million to develop and eco-refit Bridge 5 Mill, a 150 year-old former Silk Mill that Kindling now calls home.
For Helen, Kindling is another crucial way to tackle “the unjust and damaging nature of the current system”. Something she did in spades whilst accompanying human rights defenders during her year with the Peace Brigades International; for which she was jointly awarded the International Service Human Rights Award for Women.
In preparation for Kindling’s planned farm, Helen’s building on her MSc in Organic Farming by developing her practical growing experience at our Woodbank growing site.
Chiara is a scholar-activist, originally from Italy, living in the UK since 2006. She holds a PhD in Applied Sociology (University of Milano-Bicocca, 2005), a degree in Political Science (cum laude, State University of Milan, 2001), and a PgCert in European Spatial Planning (Newcastle University, UK, 2006). After working across several universities, in Italy (Politecnico di Milano, UNIMIB), Austria (TU Vienna) and the UK (University of Leeds), since 2015, she has been working at the Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience (Coventry University, UK), where she is an Associate Professor in Urban Food Sovereignty and Resilience. Her work is at the intersection between agroecological farmers movements and urban food justice and sovereignty movements; urban and peri-urban agriculture; political pedagogies for urban agroecology and the politics of prefiguration; feminist social reproduction and medicinal agroecological practices.
Two key websites about the work that Chiara is involved in:
Tom is a practitioner and systems thinker working at the intersection of community empowerment, land stewardship and organisational development. Over the past decade, he has supported communities, landowners and partners to plan projects, build strong governance, understand their finances and take on land or assets with confidence. His work focuses on helping groups move steadily from early ideas to long-term resilience.
He is the director of Rooted in Place, an organisation that helps community groups at every stage to take on, manage, and make good use of local land and assets. Before co-founding Rooted in Place, Tom held senior roles at Common Nature, Shared Assets and Ethex, where he supported a wide range of community-led organisations to develop business plans, financial models and investment-ready proposals. He helped enterprises raise over £20m in community investment and worked closely with funders, councils and landowners to design practical pathways for community stewardship.
Tom brings a relational, curious and pragmatic approach, shaped by his experience across strategy, governance design, facilitation, blended finance and programme leadership. He has contributed to national programmes and research across community land, food systems, local economic resilience and organisational capacity building – including work with DEFRA, Natural England, local authorities, social enterprises and community land trusts.
He is committed to supporting clarity in complex situations and building the foundations needed for strong, locally rooted stewardship. Tom lives in Oxford with his family.
Mark is a freelance consultant, facilitator and coach supporting the strategic development of organisations, networks, groups, projects and individuals.
He thinks, blogs, and podcasts about organisational weirdness with Kate Swade at Corporate Bodies.
He is also NED at the amazing Love Tank, Traveller Pride and Digital Commons collectively working for a healthier, more inclusive, informed, and sustainable future.
From 2011-2025, he co-founded and co-directed Shared Assets, a social enterprise which works with people and land for a just future, and acts as infrastructure for an emerging land justice movement.