The World’s Ugliest Lawn 2024
REGION GOTLAND
In January 2025, Region Gotland crowned the second winner of its wildly successful global contest, The World’s Ugliest Lawn. Big congrats to Leisa Elliott, Birdlings Flat, New Zealand!
The past 10 years have been the hottest years on record globally, and water availability is decreasing. In 2022 the Swedish island Gotland launched its yearly contest Gotland’s Ugliest Lawn to promote water conservation locally and raise awareness of the issue.
Since the initiative helped save water on Gotland, Region Gotland scaled the initiative to a global contest in 2023. It has so far generated an earned reach of 2.2 billion impressions, entries from around the world and made people question the norm of green lawns.
Since sustainability issues are long-term, sustainability communication needs to be too. That’s why Region Gotland made The World’s Ugliest Lawn a yearly contest by arranging it for a second year. Among others, Sweden’s official accounts on Instagram and Facebook promoted the contest.
Entries were submitted from the United States, Italy, Tunisia, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand.
The jury on Gotland had a lot of ugliness to evaluate, but surely found a winner – Leisa Elliott’s dry lawn in Birdlings Flat, New Zealand. The winner of the past year’s contest, Kathleen Murray in Sandford Tasmania, sent her the pre-owned first prize t-shirt and a greeting card with her congratulations.
Leisa's win was exclusively announced by The Guardian on January 10, 2025. The article was read by 150,000 people and quickly became the most viewed article in the Environment section and the third most viewed article across The Guardian. Leisa was interviewed by national and international media, and proudly showed her unwatered lawn.
An honorary mention was awarded to Emilia Vallara’s untamed garden in Brescia, Italy.
Want to read more?
> Segment about Leisa’s win on New Zealand's leading evening news programme 1News
> Interview with Leisa on the national Canadian radio network CBC Radio
> Interview with past winner Kathleen Murray on ABC Hobart, Tasmania
> Post by Sweden’s official account on Instagram
> Post by Sweden’s official account on Facebook
> Article by Radio New Zealand
For more information, contact:
Johan Gustafsson
+46 70-632 90 20
Awards
Gold in Framtidspriset in Sveriges Kommunikatörers Stora Kommunikationspriset 2025.
Bronze in Bästa Externa Kommunikation in Sveriges Kommunikatörers Stora Kommunikationspriset 2025.
