Before and after!
By: Erin Higa
HHF Planners has taken part in the U.S. Green Building Council’s Green Apple Day of Service ever since its inception three years ago, and it’s an event that our staff really looks forward to. This year, we partnered with Sustainability Teacher, Mrs. Laura Hew on a project to create a Canoe Plant Cultural Garden, Pathway and Irrigation at Wilson Elementary School.
This project represents a community-based partnership that has successfully accomplished a goal of using design to transform an outdoor play space into a living, breathing, learning place! Students at Wilson Elementary now have the opportunity to not only learn and read about canoe plants in their Hawaiian Studies curriculum, but they can take a few steps outside and experience caring for the plants in their very own garden space.
Here is a photo documentation of our project, from start-to-finish:
Along the way, we received support from these great people and organizations – Thank you!!!
- Wilson Elementary’s hard working Sustainability Teacher, Mrs. Laura Hew
- Landscape design and maintenance firm, Ultimate Innovations, Inc. who contributed some of our project’s big ticket materials
- USGBC Hawai‘i Green Schools Committee, especially the ever-helpful Green Schools Committee Chair, Melanie Wong (Mason Architects) who helped to guide and support all of the Green Apple Day teams.
- Our own HHF Board for their generous contribution, and especially Principal Rick Quinn for his time and attention to the planning, purchasing and execution of our Green Apple Day project
- Everyone who donated to the USGBC Hawai‘i GADSZOOKS! Fundraising website
- Wilson School parents, students and community members who came out in force to support both our Green Apple Day of Service project and their own Ho‘olaulima Work Day projects. Special thanks to: Mr. Milton Yamamoto, Mrs. Cynthia Hakkikawa, Mrs. Phyllis Nakasone, Mrs. Sherri Sasaki and Mr. Stacey Higashi
- All of our great HHF volunteers…
HHF Green Apple Day of Service Crew (Clockwise from far Right): Robyn Sweesy, Chris Chavez, Tomoko Naka, Angelica Rockquemore, Chelsea Gamiao, Erin Higa, Cindy Gamiao, Jesse Gamiao, Ryan Masuda, John Hagihara, Tina Bushnell, Tom Fee, Joseph Tamburello, Rick Quinn. Not pictured: Jerilyn Hanohano
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To get in touch with Ultimate Innovations, Inc. for your landscape design and maintenance needs, see their website here.
Check out our blog on last year’s Green Apple Day of Service at Hālau Kū Mana, and stay tuned to our blog to hear more about our staff’s work there.
Read our related blog, “No slide, no swings, no problem: Reimagining Children’s Outdoor Play,” by our planner and landscape designer, Angelica Rockquemore.