Our setting

A house, a garden, and 32 explorers.

Three connected rooms opening onto the garden — built for free-flow, furnished at knee height, and gated like a small, cheerful fortress.

The story

Started by two early-years teachers with a shared veggie patch.

Fran and Bea taught Prep for a decade and kept meeting four-year-olds who’d never planted anything, poured anything, or been trusted with a real trowel. Little Meadow opened in 2017 as the antidote: a preschool where the garden is a classroom and the classroom is mostly a garden with a roof.

Eight years on, the allotment beds are still going — now weeded by very small people with very strong opinions.

Hands tending a shared vegetable patch
How we care

Four promises to every family.

On the parents’ noticeboard, lived in every room.

◆

Known by name

A key educator who genuinely knows your child — and tells you the small stuff, not just incidents.

◇

Outdoors daily

Garden time every day, all weathers. Waterproofs ours, puddles theirs.

◈

Unhurried

Time to finish the game, the story, the hole. Rushing is for grown-ups.

❖

Open doors

Drop in any time unannounced — a setting that needs notice is telling you something.

Around the meadow

A Wednesday, roughly 10am.

What the middle of a good morning looks like.

An empty mud kitchen ready for play

The mud kitchen

Open all weathers

A cosy book corner with cushions under a tree

The book corner

Where the flop happens

Raised vegetable growing beds with small trowels

The growing beds

Strong opinions, small trowels

A craft table set with natural making materials

The making table

Glitter contained, mostly

Small tables set for lunch in a bright room

Lunch

Marisa’s kitchen, small tables

A line of small gumboots by the door

The welly line

32 pairs, chaos-adjacent

The team

Nine adults worth copying.

Average six years at the Meadow — children thrive on faces that stay.

Fran Hollis, co-founder and manager

Fran Hollis

Co-founder & Manager

Bea Msimang, co-founder and inclusion lead

Bea Msimang

Co-founder & Inclusion Lead
Marisa Conti, cook

Marisa Conti

Cook — the most popular adult

The best tour is an ordinary morning.

Come at 9:30 on any weekday and see it mid-flow — small groups, big plans, someone inevitably being a dinosaur.

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