CityCo’s Manchester Garden City 'Grow Boxes’ initiative has won a RHS North West In Bloom Award, in the 2011 'Grow Your Own’ category.

The awards recognise the efforts of communities to improve and care for their local environment through imaginative planting of trees, shrubs, flowers and landscaping, conservation and recycling projects.

The competiton is based on four elements: Horticultural excellence, Community involvement, Environmental friendliness and Sustainability.

The Grow Boxes, which are looked after by the Northern Quarter Greening Group and are now blooming with vegetables and flowers, are part of a wider planting scheme in Piccadilly Basin.

The project was the first in the series of Manchester Garden City initiatives that have been delivered this year by CityCo and partners BDP and Manchester City Council. Plans are now being worked up for 2012 projects.

Manchester Garden City is a joint initiative in support of a long-term strategy to make Manchester city centre greener.

The North West In Bloom Awards are part of the RHS’s most popular horticultural campaign Britain In Bloom