GREEN-FINGERED Barrhead residents have been helping to prepare the town’s old waterworks for the seasons ahead.

People of all ages attended the Make Your Mark event at the former sewage works to help sow seeds for the spring and summertime and demonstrated their artistry to create welcome signs, trail marks and signage denoting its various wildflower areas.

Parents and schoolchildren alike made their mark on the Big Lottery-funded site by sowing a section of a wildflower meadow and jotting down new ideas for the future of the site, which lies near the former Nestle Purina factory on Glasgow Road.

Featuring old concrete sewage tanks that now form the largest flower pots in Scotland, the two-hectare site was empty for more than 30 years until its transformation in 2014.

As the flagship site of Grow Wild Scotland, an initiative which encourages the development of new green spaces, the project has been a prime example of how an abandoned industrial wasteland can be transformed into a community-friendly wildflower haven since its creation two years ago.

The preparations on April 6 also featured chalk art, crafts and urban exploration trips to help keep youngsters amused in the blustery conditions.

John Shelton, East Renfrewshire Council’s Green Network project officer, said: “We had Barrhead High and St Luke’s planting the community orchard but what we don’t have is any kind of entrance features.

“It’s really just about encouraging people to design the site themselves and then have a say in how this is taken forward in the future.

“It’s to keep the community involved in developing the site and to make sure that things keep on happening here.”

He added: “This is the first of many events and we’ll be promoting those in the next few weeks.

“We want to try and encourage as many people in the community to come down and have their say to see how we can make the site even better than it is now.”