Growing here since 1903
Pioneer Nursery takes its name from the Letchworth Pioneers, the people who built the world's first Garden City. When they planned the town they set these four acres aside for horticulture, and the trees and plants that landscaped the new Letchworth were grown and held here.
The nursery has changed its job several times since. It has supplied a town under construction, fed local shops and market stalls, sat neglected under brambles, and been brought back to life more than once. The ground has been worked continuously for well over a century.
A short history
- 1903
The Garden City pioneers allocate the four-acre site to horticulture. Trees and plants are grown here for the building and landscaping of Letchworth.
- Mid 20th century
The site turns to market gardening, supplying local businesses and market stalls with food.
- To the late 1980s
The market garden keeps working, on much the same ground and much the same layout.
- 1990s
The land changes hands and names several times and falls into decline. By 1999 it is under brambles and marestail, though the bones of the nursery are still there.
- 1999
John Hoyland and Nick Downing take on the old site and bring it back into active horticultural use as a specialist plant nursery.
- 2013
Key Essentials arrives, with the aim of returning the nursery to a role serving the local community.
- 2024
Kelley & Ashleigh Barrell take over the business and re-open the Nursery to the public. The Coffee Shop opens in April.
- Today
Four acres of open growing areas, greenhouses and polytunnels, a coffee shop, community markets, and a very large collection of air plants.
Family run
The nursery had become run down through the covid years. Since taking over in February 2024 we have put a good deal of work into the place, and a good deal of life back into it.
It is a family business in the plainest sense: mum, three daughters and a niece, alongside a friendly team of staff who know their plants and are happy to be asked.
- Kelley Barrell Managing Director
- Ashleigh Barrell Operations Director
- April Foster Sales & Marketing Executive
- Amelia Barrell Social Media Executive
- Zoe Reeve Social Media Executive
- Emma Coyne Sales & Commercial Executive
- Libby Ramsden Coffee Shop Supervisor
Part of the village
We hold Spring and Christmas markets with local stallholders, and we host meetings for community groups through the year. The site is a quiet one, and people are welcome to walk round it whether or not they are buying.