Kitchen garden, Miniforest and a hayfield
On the slope above the Slaggbyggnaden building lies the most recently established part of the museum’s garden — namely the kitchen garden and the forest garden, The Miniforest. To the north, they are bordered by a traditional fence.
The knowledge of building these kinds of fences is an important part of our intangible cultural heritage. These fences have been used throughout Finland to enclose fields and residential areas, protecting them from grazing livestock, wild animals, and thieves. Building and maintaining the traditional fence was everyone’s responsibility. The national laws contained detailed regulations regarding the construction and upkeep of these fences, and the village council members used to carry out inspections of them.
As far as we know, the construction of traditional fences is not taught at any educational institution in Finland today, but the knowledge is preserved among individuals. Here in the Hammarbacken garden, the traditional fence has been built with the help of volunteers, led by local expert Klas Österlund, one of the museum’s active volunteers.
The meadow above the traditional fence is usually mowed with a scythe in the summer, and the grass is dried on hay racks, which, together with the fence, contribute to the sense of cultural landscape in the garden area.
The hay rack became common in the 1920s when people began to cultivate hay instead of relying on naturally growing hay. Naturally growing hay was usually dried on the ground, but the cultivated hay was not suitable for ground drying — a challenge made worse during rainy hay harvest seasons.
The method of drying hay on racks was imported from Sweden and helped improve the quality of the hay. Even after wartime, in Finland’s eastern and northern regions, people continued to scythe hay from natural meadows, which had already become quite rare in the southern parts of the country by the 1930s.
The forest garden, The Miniforest, is a collaboration with the Finnish artist Nina Backman. The forest garden is designed to include many different layers of plants, such as trees, various perennials in the form of shrubs and ground covers, as well as deadwood.
Nina Backman describes her project as part of an international collaborative initiative that combines tree planting, botanical knowledge, and art. The trees and plants have been locally selected to suit the Finnish climate. In our urban environments, green spaces promote the movement of animals between different areas and the surrounding forest. Each project helps to support and preserve the area’s unique biodiversity.
In the kitchen garden, there are three cultivation beds for annual crops that can be planted and harvested in connection with various children’s workshops. The types of plants grown there vary depending on what works best for the specific conditions of this garden and for the workshops being offered, although we also like to look back in time and choose vegetables and root crops that the ironworks’ workers have historically grown here.
We use the “no dig” method — meaning we cultivate without digging or turning the soil — and instead simply add compost and mulch materials as needed. This approach is used to avoid disturbing the micro-life in the soil and to allow decomposition processes to take their time, so that the soil doesn’t release more carbon dioxide than necessary.
In areas not being sown, we cover the ground with organic materials like grass or straw, or sow a so-called cover crop to protect the soil. This makes it harder for weeds to take over and helps prevent things like soil erosion or nutrient runoff into the surrounding environment. During dry summers, it also helps keep the soil moist, reducing the need for watering.