Cherry Trees Project Update
8 Apr 2026
Late last year, North Walsham in Bloom volunteers were invited to compete for funding under the North Norfolk High Streets Matter Programme for a significant plant-based project to enhance the town centre.
With our increasingly hot summers driven by global warming, we thought planting some trees to provide shade in the Market Place would be a good idea. Trees mitigate warming, improve air quality, and provide essential cooling through evapotranspiration, as well as helping to combat climate change by acting as natural carbon sinks, absorbing carbon dioxide through photosynthesis and storing it in biomass and soils. We didn’t want to disturb the new paving, so opted for large planters to contain the trees. After researching trees and planters to identify the ideal combination in keeping with the setting and at the best possible price, we submitted our proposal to the judging panel, who unanimously approved our scheme, awarding us a grant of £6,680. The project has not cost the Town Council a penny and had we not applied, North Walsham residents would have missed out, so we were delighted our scheme was chosen.
Following a site visit with Norfolk County Council Highways Department, we got permission to site five Corten steel planters (similar to the one at the recently regenerated Black Swan Loke garden, installed under the HAZ scheme) in the Market Place. We chose pre-weathered Corten steel planters with hidden raised bases and drainage holes (from Taylor Made Planters Ltd) because they will last for decades, with the layer of rust acting as a protective coating, meaning no maintenance is required. Their generous size means the trees can stay in them indefinitely.
The trees we chose are Winter flowering cherries, Prunus subhirtella Autumnalis (from Practical Plants Ltd). They are pretty trees which come into bloom periodically from October through to March, with their pale pink flowers bringing cheer at what can be a dreary time of year. In the summer their attractive foliage will provide the shade we wanted to introduce and in autumn the leaves turn beautiful shades of gold and orange before the flowering cycle starts again. In pots these trees will grow to a height and spread of about 4 metres (12 feet) in ten to twenty years.
The grant award has also allowed us to enhance some of the beds and borders around the town centre with additional herbaceous perennials - long-lived plants without a woody structure, whose growth dies down annually over winter but whose roots survive so the plant produces fresh growth in the spring, flowering through the summer.
In mid-March we were joined by children from Millfield Primary School to help us plant some of these herbaceous perennials around the base of the trees for colour and interest through until late autumn. We chose low maintenance Geranium ‘Rozanne’ and Geum ‘Princess Juliana’ because their contrasting colours will work well together and they have a long flowering season. The children also planted 300 bulbs - Dutch Iris ‘Mickey Gold’ - for some extra summer zing! In the autumn we’ll add spring-flowering bulbs to give us early colour next year, before the perennials come back into flower.
The North Norfolk High Streets Matter Programme works with local businesses and community organisations to support local projects to help drive footfall and dwell time in town centres and improve resident and visitor experiences within our retail and commercial centres, boosting local economic growth and supporting the vitality of our towns. You can find more information about the help on offer under this programme at north-norfolk.gov.uk.
It has taken time and effort by our volunteers over a few months to deliver this project, working with the town, district and county councils and the fantastic team of groundsmen here in North Walsham, so we really hope you like it!
New volunteers are always welcome to join our friendly group and no experience is needed – we can show you what to do and provide any tools needed. Just come and speak to us on a Tuesday morning (we usually meet at 9.45am by the Post Office and you can spot us around town in our hi-vis tabards) or call our chair, Eric Seward, on 01692 403784.
