That's brilliant. I struggled with ripping up grass this spring. Love what you did, thanks for sharing!!!

Adamark, not only do I love your visual for the lasagna bed, but I also LOVE the fact that you rerouted your gutter in that 50 gallon drum with a spicket none the less!! Nice very Nice!!

we have four of those drumas. I have to admitt, we didn't use the water as much as we should. However, this year, I'll connect them to soakers and definitly will use the rain water much more. Anyway, last year was the first year for:
1/ growing under lights (with mixed results)
2/ winter sowing with, generally, very good results
3/ two new lasagna beds
4/ fenced container garden - one day, I'll post pictures
5/ additional container gardening with 5-1-1 soil mixture(see Container forum)
6/ raised bed gardening (I posted in the Potager forum)

So, in general, it was an eventfull year. Now, I'm looking forward for the this year to learn more.

Fabulous photos tell the story. And thanks for the details (like 3' is wide enough). Good job!

Thank you so much for sharing. Now I can begin to build another bed for all the seeds I expect to germinate. The visual is excellent!

Square foot gardening suggests a four foot wide square bed as one can easily reach 2ft from any side. My first gardening here was two four foot squares. I later made some beds 3 ft wide and found it was just a bit too wide, an uncomfortable stretch. Those that I made 2 ft wide are much easier to work with. (This is of course, beds that are accessed from only one side like the one you have above.)

Great process in bed making and I also noted the rain barrel.

How many tomatoes did you plant in the area? I counted about 2 doz. poles. Any concerns with the spacing and growth issues? I would like to grow more tomatoes in less space.

Terrific pictures Adamark!! Your veggies look great too. It works even better, if you start making the bed in the fall for the following Spring. Lasagne aka sheet composting has been very effective for me, although I still dig a lot, when impatient to plant things.

mnwgal - if I could chime in on your question- I planted tomatoes maybe a little farther apart, not much, and I was wishing at the end of the season I had given them more space. I pulled out 5 plants that didn't do anything b/c they weren't getting enough sun or competing for nutrients.

Despite that, the San Marzanos did pretty well, although I think they could have done better. The Sungold cherry did outstanding, grape pretty good. Green zebra not good, and the one and only Pink Brandywine (turned out to be my favorite) that I planted yielded 4 tomatoes that I waited a long long time for.

mnwsgal - you are correct, 3 feet might also be too wide. Mine was about four feet. I thought that those stepping pieces of wood would do. On the top, we aided the fence. The fence served two purposses, protect basil from rabbits and keep those brick wall together. So, as you can imagine, fence and wide bed made picking up tomatoes and taking care of them quite a struggle. On the top of that, there were MUCH too many of them. If I would plant half, I would have similar or better crop.
However, as I said, that was my first year and I wanted to proof myfelf (and, most importantly, my DH) that:
1/ tomatoes will grow on "the cardboard"
2/ that someting will come from those "leggy, good for nothing, planted MUCH too early, etc, etc" seedlings

Thahk you all for your kind words

That looks like such a great tomato bed - yes, I'm jealous since gardening in a climate where ripe tomatoes before first frost can be really hit and miss :)

But I'd just like to add for anyone thinking of copying that design who might not be planning vegetables or annuals but a perennial or shrub bed....and please understand this is coming from someone who has never once said 'I wish I'd made that bed smaller' but quite the opposite -

I'd make it deeper front to back, not less if a more permanent planting was what was in mind. I'd add more out from the house and wouldn't have it accessible from only the front but would leave room to walk in behind it. That would make weeding and plant maintenance reachable from two sides, but more important, with a planting of perennials or shrubs there are still going to be times during home ownership that house is going to need its own maintenance or attention. There's nothing worse than finding the landscaping is in the way of work needed by the original investment - the house. Been there, done that, and if I ever have a new house and new gardens, I won't do it again.

This is so ture Morz8,I planted 3 Arborvitaeties last year,making sure I left enough room behind them do do house upkeep,when needed, so many times, you see them planted right next to the house, good point you brought out.
cAROL

Good Ideas. Nice Pictures Adamark!

That is such a great story--thanks adamark. And of course I love potager garden pics too :)

Great job. I love our lasagna beds. We've tried taking out sod but then we lose about 8" (old pasture). I would just advise building the beds higher since they will condense and shrink just in one season. I aimed for 18-24" and the original bed is now back to ground level.

Good reminder, morz8. I am redoing the beds along the East side of the house and have left 2 ft clearance next to the house for maintenance of both the house and the beds.

The bed along the back of the garage only has 1 foot clearance
which I have found is not enough.

My narrow beds are along the fence of my veggie bed. I have beds along all four sides and two tall raised beds in the center.

They seem to be missing from my Photobucket account but here is a link where they are about 2/3 way down.

Here is a link that might be useful: Veggie Garden layout

How soon can you plant into the bed after you fill it up like this? I've got a ton of cardboard strips that have been taking their time migrating to the recycle bin. If I threw those out now along with my mail and newspapers, and topped it off with soil and food scraps at the end of January, would it be ready this spring?

manda 3 - last year, I started in the Spring. I didn't have dates on my camera that time, so I'm not sure exactly when. Judging by the order of my pictures, it was just befor the Easter. I haven't done this in one day. I was adding additional material with time. As it was pointed out, it did condensed. At the begining, I started with carboard, coffee grounds, kitchen scabs. With time, I knew I had to use material ready for planting. So, I had a layer of soil, peat most, compost, etc. Frankly, I was using whatever I could find on sale at that time. I think, I was building almost until tomatoes' planting time. Interesting, the bed didn't shrank much more.
In the fall, when I cleaned tomatoes, I removed the fence and my DH took those bricks away (they are left over from building a house and will be used for outside BBQ). Anyway, in the spring he'll build me a bed from wood, similar to other beds in the garden. As a matter of fact, he wants the space between the house and the bed (see morz8's comments). I guess, we'll have to do it.

BTW, last year, I've buit two beds like this. This one was for tomatoes, the other one was for potaoes. I didn't have much soil, compost, etc, etc. So the potatoes bed didn't get much of that good staff. Needless to say, I can attest, potaoes don't like to grow on the carboard only and be covered with only strow. But that's another story and, again, quite a few pictures....