Cultural Garden

The City Center Market was awarded the 2022 Community Garden Grant by the South Carolina Association for Community Economic Development (SCACED).

The Cultural Garden of the City Center Market was built to attract a broader and accurate scope of the Florence community. The garden will also be an interactive teaching tool for community members, social clubs, and all Florence School Districts to visit and engage. Any produce grown in the garden will be available at no cost to anyone who wants to harvest it, as the garden will be open to the public.

The market’s focus is to provide a space to share cultural history through its diverse foodways and to open a dialogue about the health benefits of gardening and how vegetables, herbs, and flowers contribute to healthy living.

Alice Caldwell, who has been the Market Attendant for the farmer's market for the last four years, has always been interested in nutrition and food, plants, farming, and other cultures her entire life. She grew fruits, vegetables, and herbs for her friends and family. Although her full-time job as a Nurse Practitioner left little time, she began to grow vegetables commercially for her husband's market in Florence, Hartsville, and Myrtle Beach.

The Cultural Garden features a variety of plants grown from seed and carefully tended by Alice and other City Center employees. Rather than focusing on one specific culture or theme, the garden represents the diversity of the Florence community through a variety of plants, herbs, vegetables, and flowers from different cultures and regions. The garden continues to serve as an educational and interactive space where community members can learn about gardening, foodways, cultural traditions, and the connection between plants and healthy living.