HFHK finishes its 17th garden rebuild

Over the past three summers HFHK has worked with 17 partner schools to rebuild their HFHK school gardens. These rebuilds, graciously funded by Highmark, and one school funded by Corteva, were critical for program continuity. After 7+ years of use, and having grown fallow from the COVID-19 pandemic, the old beds needed to be ripped out and new ones built and installed so the students could continue growing.

While we were fortunate to have good weather for most of our builds, the last ones packed some whammies. The night before Brookside Elementary School’s rebuild on August 8, a terrible storm swept through the neighborhood creating many downed trees, road closures and power outages. Brookside’s garden shed was completely destroyed and the build was canceled out of safety concerns. It was rescheduled for Oct. 7. Later that month, a shipping snafu for Sussex Academy’s new garden forced us to reschedule their build too - although the shed was built!