Borde Hill near Haywards Heath gets lottery funding for project

Borde Hill near Haywards Heath received the cash from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to use for its Reinventing Borde Hill scheme.

The project will enable Borde Hill to unlock 110 acres of listed landscape and improve access to the site.

Key elements of the project include an all-year-round eco lodge, a pedestrian route to encourage accessible and green travel, Dinosaur Wood for outdoor learning and play and a Grower's Community Garden.

Set in the rolling hills of the Sussex High Weald, Borde Hill is a Grade II* listed park and garden.

The botanical collection at Borde Hill includes many plant species found nowhere else in Britain, and one of the country’s largest privately

Borde Hill is a listed park and garden near Haywards Heath (Image: Borde Hill)

The project will reinvent the garden’s South Park as a thriving destination while honouring and celebrating its rich and important botanical history.

Plans are to provide accessible new facilities in the South Park and at Sugworth Farm which will offer a series of educational and community programmes to engage a new and diverse audience.

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People will be able to learn, play, and reconnect with the natural environment. The project will encourage and facilitate outdoor learning, discovery and play for children and young people of all ages, fostering a closer connection with nature.

Borde Hill will work with NHS social prescribers to help people from the area experience the mental and physical benefits of being in nature.

A sustainable new eco lodge building will provide a year-round community space on the edge of the tranquil Robertsmere Lake.

The project will also create new employment opportunities for people, with Borde Hill Charity recruiting a horticultural apprentice, a community growing officer, and park rangers.

The construction project will support 26 jobs over one year.

The works on Borde Hill will create new jobs and volunteering roles (Image: Borde Hill)

Borde Hill will also increase its volunteering opportunities, engaging with an additional 69 volunteers throughout the project, as well as expanding its work experience programme for secondary schools in the area.

Jay Goddard, managing director and fifth-generation family custodian of Borde Hill, said: "We are absolutely delighted to have received this support from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, which is testament to the significance of this project.

"Thanks to money raised by National Lottery players we can now unlock new areas of Borde Hill, providing vital access to green space for our local community, and creating important opportunities to learn about our shared natural heritage, while also safeguarding our nationally important botanical collection and natural landscape for generations to come."

Stuart McLeod, director of London and South England at The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said: "Landscapes and nature form the bedrock of our culture and heritage, improving wellbeing, sparking curiosity, and protecting and providing for the community’s surrounding and inhabiting them. That’s why we’re proud to fund Borde Hill to deliver this project that will open up this historically and horticulturally significant landscape."