The Urban Oasis garden feature at RHS Cardiff showcases how all manner of outdoor spaces can be designed so people can get the very best out of them. The garden has been designed by award-winning garden designer Chris Beardshaw. It is one of five special gardens for Groundwork and the RHS, being showcased across the 2012 season of RHS Flower Shows.

Different Welsh natural habitats are displayed: grasslands, wetlands and the woodland floor - to represent the transformation that has taken place in Parc Taf Bargoed, once a disused colliery and no-go area, now a magnificent municipal park used for cycling, fishing, walking and canoeing.

On a smaller scale, bringing nature to people’s doorsteps, especially amongst dense housing is possible through the simplest of measures such as birdboxes, logpiles and insect hotels. A simple experiment station is there to connect children in particular to ways of monitoring and understanding the natural world.

Handmade woodcrafts in the garden have been made by volunteers from Groundwork who are learning horticultural and carpentry skills. This garden will be re-created by those same volunteers at the charity’s environmental centre in Merthyr Tydfil.

Urban Oasis is a challenge to us all to support the green spaces in our midst wherever we live – and this year Groundwork and the RHS are working to get communities gardening and to involve more people in transforming neighbourhoods.

Why not find out more about how you can support a project near you that is in need of its own urban oasis or discover how you could take action.

Take a tour of the garden with Chris:

More about the Urban Oasis garden at RHS Cardiff