Celebrating Sustainability Fortnight
“At the garden I aim to create a ground for growth in which people from all backgrounds can share challenges and solutions.”
Emilio Garcia Padron is an MSc Applied Mathematics part-time student at Imperial and the founder and coordinator of RE:GEN @ Imperial – an Imperial College Union campaign aiming to protect, restore and expand green spaces around campus.
A community approach
Emilio explains that coordinating RE:GEN involves addressing challenges across various pillars: operational, academic, education and social.
“Connecting with staff and students from across campus to co-create events is the bread and butter of my work. I’ve worked with stakeholders to plan events like Garden Hackathons, sustainability seminars, wellbeing events and team building workshops. RE:GEN aims to challenge what people think happens in a garden and innovate how people can work and be outdoors.”
Following a President’s Community Fund grant, RE:GEN is building a brand-new community garden in South Kensington.
“I enjoy facilitating these sessions in which students from across campus come to develop the space together. We’re aiming to bring one thousand students and staff to these sessions over the next six months. Building what could become the largest community-garden in central London by mobilising the university community fills me with the zeal to keep pushing.”
Emilio rarely has free time after founding a startup called NEA Studio three years ago. Working with a team of six developers, NEA provides software solutions to non-technical businesses, helping breach the gap in digital literacy and capacity of rural areas.
Outside of work you will find Emilio somewhere exploring London with friends or his partner.
“London can get quite overwhelming at times. At those times I enjoy some alone time at the V&A’s members’ room having a long drink.”
Cultivating growth
Emilio graduated in 2023 from Lancaster University as a theoretical physicist. While at Lancaster Emilio joined an eco-gardening society in a bid to escape post-lockdown isolation.
“At the garden I found a unique community of people that shaped, and continue to shape, my life.”
In an effort to give back to this group that helped him thrive he decided to become president of the society with the slogan “Gardening for All”.
“I wanted to scale the society so more people could experience what I felt the year before”.
During Emilio’s tenure the society grew to the third largest student group on campus and was awarded the union sustainability award. In his acceptance speech Emilio pledged to: “start a garden wherever I go”. Now at Imperial, he fulfils this promise through RE:GEN.
Innovation is a key value in Emilio’s work.
“Having an open mind to accept challenges and question why? things happenare personality defining traits. At the garden I aim to create a ground for growth in which people from all backgrounds can share challenges and solutions. I dream of a time where a passionate member of university can approach me with an idea and the community garden can provide them with the resources, space and people to realise their innovation.”
Read next
Meet Emilio and the RE:GEN team during Sustainability Fortnight (24 February to 7 March 2025). Learn more about their campaign at our Sustainability Fair and take part in their drop-in gardening sessions.
Interested in biodiversity on campus? Imperial’s Sustainability strategy outlines what the university is doing to safeguard and conserve our natural ecosystems and to promote biodiversity across our estate (see page 13 of the strategy).