Many people think that to live a green life you must live in the country but these days the Good Life is coming to the city, writes Julia Stephenson

Ten years ago, seduced by Country Life property porn I sold my comfy warm city flat and moved to a freezing house in a bleak Sussex wood. It was awfulI squandered months slaving over wheelbarrows of stinking pig manure desperately trying to coax growth from the barren ground. My carbon emissions shot up as I had to drive everywhere.

I soon hot-footed it back to Chelsea and now live in a top-floor flat next to Peter Jones, the mother ship. Here I have solar panels, a wood-burning stove, flush my loo with rainwater, keep chickens and grow vegetables in containers. My lemon tree is flourishing. I’ve ditched my car as I can walk to local shops; buses and tubes are within easy reach. There is a farmer’s market around the corner and I have a box of authentically misshapen veg delivered every week. Being a green townie has never been so easy.

1. Rent an Allotment. Allotments help community spirit and are an opportunity to meet people from all walks of life. Each council is responsible for maintaining allotments in its area but waiting lists can be long. But by law you only need 6 residents to petition their council for new allotment areas to be created - so for people without any outside space, it's a great idea to band together with locals and badger your council. Costs vary from £15 to £61 a year depending on size. www.london.gov.uk/allotments  for information about how to get started.

2. Dig for victory. Exciting food-growing initiatives are springing up all over the capital. Last year a fancy housing development in Bloomsbury ran out of money and the land was handed over to the community to create allotments. Meanwhile Mayor Boris Johnston along with London food czar Rosie Boycott have set up a scheme called Capital Growth www.capitalgrowth.org which offers help with growing our own food on roofs, window boxes and any unused land, creating as Rosie puts it, “a sea of green in the air”. They will put people who have land in touch with people who would like to use it. The scheme is also helping children grow their own fruit and vegetables at school.

3. Make your window boxes work for you. I’m not very green-fingered but still manage to grow 8 different types of herbs in 2 window boxes. Most supermarket herbs are over-packaged, over-priced and grown in far lung places like Israel yet herbs are very easy to grow and will flourish despite a certain degree of neglect. A bonus of gardening on windowsills means that you don't get the usual pests and bugs as if you were growing directly in the ground.

4. Create an instant kitchen garden. Last summer I had great success with a kitchen garden (composed of lots of half grown seedlings) delivered straight to my door in recyclable cardboard packaging. This is perfect for the less confident gardener who still wants to grow and pick their own home-grown veg. www.rocketgardens.co.uk

5. Save money and make your own compost. Some councils now recycle kitchen leftovers, but it makes no sense to give them a valuable resource that can easily be turned into healthy vitamin-rich crumbly compost that your houseplants, window boxes and gardens will adore. www.wigglywigglers.com sell a wide variety of attractive compost bins and wormeries made from recycled plastic (if you have no outside space they sell odourless bokashi bins which you can keep in your kitchen). They will send worms through the post in special breathe-proof bags. Fortunately worms are robust. I went travelling for 6 months and they were still going strong on my return. As I can’t resist buying compost bins I’m sneakily colonizing my next door neighbour’s flat roof with them, (I’m in danger of turning into the Bernard Matthews of worm `factory’ farming). I have dreadful visions of weighty bins collapsing through my neighbour’s roof and landing on his head but I’m sure I can convince him that a worm toupee is a small price to pay for helping to reduce the nation’s waste.

6. Rescue an ex-battery chicken. If you have any outdoor space at all consider adopting an ex-battery chicken from the Battery Hen Rescue Trust

(www.bhwt.org.uk).  A year ago we adopted three which are now living happily on our flat roof (giving shoppers in the Peter Jones haberdashery department opposite quite a shock). They live in a rather makeshift wooden pen my boyfriend constructed out of waste wood from our loft conversion. Unlike a country friend’s classy special breed hens which rarely produce eggs (obviously too posh to push) our scraggly girls are veritable egg layers, rewarding us with 3 eggs a day and thrive on leftovers. Fresh eggs make popular presents too.
 
7. Keep Bees. London honey is delicious because town bees have a wide range of flowers and foliage to feast on. In 2003, London honey won first prize at the National Honey Show. The London Beekeeping Association (www.ibka.org.uk) run one and two day Introduction to Beekeeping courses throughout the year in Kennington. These courses are designed to equip students with everything will need to keep their own bees. Forthcoming courses will be held on Sat/Sun 17-18 April, Sat/Sun 15-16 May.

Bees have come under ever greater threat from diseases which we don’t fully understand and there are fears that Colony Collapse Disorder responsible for massive losses in the USA may emerge here. Do your bit and support the British Beekeeper organization campaign to save our bees (www.britishbee.org.uk )
 
Meanwhile buy London honey at Borough Market, or through the delightful Hive Honey Shop (www.thehivehoneyshop.co.uk) in Clapham which also sells its own range of home-made honey beauty products. They are running a weekend course for beginners this May.

8. Install a wood-burning stove. Many stoves are now clean enough to be legally used in urban smoke-free zones. Finding wood is easy because the mania for home renovation means there is loads of it lying around in skips for the taking, if not liberated it will end up in landfill taking years to rot and creating methane, contributing to global.

Not only will it slash your heating bills but it will rejuvenate the man in your life too. Collecting wood will reawaken his Neanderthal hunter gatherer impulses, instead of staggering in from the pub empty-handed he will arrive wreathed in smiles and bearing fuel.

You'll find a good selection ar www.stovesareus.co.uk.