Toyota GB’s ‘Truly Amazing’ Garden Wins Surrey Wildlife Trust Award 2017

Toyota GB has won the Surrey Wildlife Trust’s Best Business garden award 2017 for its ground-breaking Eco HQ in Burgh Heath.

Having been a local employer in Epsom for many years, Toyota has demonstrated how business and nature can successfully co-exist together. The company has created a series of garden margins to increase biodiversity and enable wildlife to thrive, while creating an attractive backdrop for the offices. The outdoor area features a series of areas for staff to walk through and sit in during breaks.

Dawn Fielding, the Trust’s Wildlife Gardening Officer, said: “When I visited the gardens I was looking for a range of habitats as this attracts a greater diversity of wildlife. Ponds, fruit trees, herbs, flowers throughout the seasons, hedges and trees, long grass and log piles – variety is definitely the spice of life for wildlife!”

The Surrey Wildlife Trust described Toyota’s gardens as ‘… truly amazing, designed to be in harmony with nature, to be part of a green super highway! Packed with native wildflower meadows, fruit orchards (with local varieties of fruit including damsons, pears and apples), trees and shrubs. This well designed space makes an attractive backdrop for the business as well as offering an amazing space for wildlife to thrive. Evidence of 12 scarce invertebrates plus amphibians, birds and bats.’

Alan Jennings, Manager, Corporate Planning and CSR for Toyota GB, said, “We are delighted to have won this Surrey Wildlife Trust’s Garden Award. Since moving to our Burgh Heath site in 2001 we have put various wildlife initiatives in place, introducing native plant species from the surrounding countryside and even introducing a number of beehives to the site.  Winning this award is a real credit to our organisation and recognises all the hard work that has been put into making the garden come alive. It also highlights our commitment to sustainability within our business, products and surroundings.”

The awards attracted more than 150 entries this year and all entrants whose garden qualified received a bronze, silver or gold certificate declaring their garden to be an official wildlife haven. Gold award winners were also presented with a special commemorative plaque.

The Wildlife Garden Award 2017 is part of the Trust’s ‘Wild About Gardens’ campaign, working with the RHS to encourage wildlife friendly gardening. It forms part the Trust’s vision for a ‘Living Landscape’, which aims to provide a network of natural habitats so that wildlife can thrive and move across our landscape.