Gowling WLG has created a brand-new wellbeing and wildlife garden for its colleagues and clients at its office in London, in partnership with Walworth Garden, a unique charity dedicated to changing lives through horticulture.

The garden provides a private space for employees to take some time to themselves in a peaceful and relaxing environment, featuring a pond, bird boxes, log stacks, and bug hotels to encourage and host a variety of different species of wildlife and biodiversity. It is part of Gowling WLG's Responsible Business nature focus, PLANET+, a framework that aims to tackle the firm's environmental impacts and energy demand, and reflects good practice within the internationally-recognised standards ISO14001 and ISO50001.

A number of workshops have been held in the run-up to the opening of the garden for colleagues to be a part of the decision-making process when it comes to plant choices and features that they would like to see so it can be of maximum benefit to them. Representatives from Walworth Garden also discussed how the wildlife pond will have an impact on the amount of biodiversity in the local area and how employees can work together to keep it healthy.

Heidi Newbigging, Head of Responsible Business at Gowling WLG, said: "I'm extremely proud of this project which has been carried out in collaboration with a number of departments and colleagues. It has already become a beloved spot, creating a tranquil space for all.

"Spaces such as this are quite a luxury in city-based offices, and we want to encourage people to use the garden to just get away from their desk for a while, support local wildlife and use the garden to gather with friends, colleagues and clients. With summer having just started, we're excited to see colleagues make the most of it and local wildlife move in!"

Emma Pioli, Chair at Gowling WLG, added: "As a business, we are continually looking at ways we can mitigate our environmental impact and improve our offices for our people. The garden is something we have been planning for a little while now and we are excited to finally open it to colleagues.

"We want them to look forward to coming into work and have a safe and peaceful space to be able to take a proper break. Our people are what make the firm, so we want to do what we can to help look after them and make it as enjoyable of a place as possible."

Visit our Gowling WLG ESG approach page for more information.