David Low

Area Rep since 2020, now Joint Head of Residential Planting

David Low is our Area Rep for Crofton Park. He is a proud stay-at-home dad, and main carer for his two-year-old son Leo, "a most interesting role" agreed together with his wife Bec. As dad he is especially keen to foster an awareness of the Nature outside their front door, in particular its flora and fauna as found in their local Hilly Fields open space.

He explains this doesn’t really come naturally. "I was born and bred in a Balham family that had an allotment and encouraged dips locally or at the seaside no matter the temperature. But that was about it for Nature. My education in that way has been more recent. For instance, I think I must have always taken street trees for granted, but now that I 'see' them as an STfL volunteer I marvel at their great beauty and variety."

David has spent his working life as a historian, chiefly of photographs. His book Picturing the Ottoman Armenian World was published in 2022. It was based on a recently completed PhD and is, perhaps, a filial appreciation and homage to his maternal family's homeland. He says, “In writing a book I wanted to present photographs of that era not as vestiges of a lost world but as creations of a vibrant one and the products of lives being lived”.

David has much to say about the benefits of volunteering for STfL. “I love meeting people in their own environment, walking the streets as an end in itself, and mentally mapping my own habitat. But my happiest moment as an Area Rep was seeing the first tree I had helped to plant. I still say hello each time I pass by.”