Pine sleepers, plenty of soil, manure and mulch, and a selection of tubestock resurrected some old front garden beds.
The project
Updated two existing garden beds in our front yard with mostly native tubestock and elevated with sleepers.
Steps
Step 1
I saw an idea in one of my old gardening books and wanted to re-create it in our front yard. I also wanted to work with the existing square garden beds instead of trying to remove them due to their brick on concrete surrounds.
Forgot to take before photo so had to use one from the real estate listing when we bought.
Step 2
The plants in them weren't very happy and I soon found out why. Someone didn't take them out of their pots before planting!
Step 3
I am terrible at taking progress photos when I get stuck into something so went through my security camera to grab some screen shots when we were all done.
Step 4
With the beds cleared of plants, pots and roots, we brought left over soil around from our back yard to build up volume. We cut the four 3m sleepers in half, with mitre cuts to butt them against each other to make an offset square. Before putting them in the garden, I painted them with the timber protector to extend their life and make them darker. We used batten screws to connect them.
Step 5
We then cut the 2.4m sleepers the same to create a smaller offset square. We filled the first layer then filled the top layer with the soil, soil improver and cow manure.
Step 6
We had a huge pile of mulch from dropping a few trees that we had shredded, so barrowed that around as well. I really liked the look of the black sleepers so I cleaned up the bricks with a wire brush, dusted and painted with black Dulux Weathershield.
Step 7
I love native plants so chose a mostly native selection and had them delivered.
Step 8
Hubby wanted Golden Pendas in the middle of each garden so I had to wait for a month or so for them to come in as the dwarf ones weren't ready yet.
Step 9
Eight months down the track, most of the plants are doing well, I lost a couple and replaced them.
Step 10
Two years on, I sadly lost my Westringias and a couple of Grevilleas but the rest aren't doing too bad. I've just given everything a bit of a prune to try and bush it out a bit more. I have about three empty spots that I need to fill, just haven't decided on what plants yet.
Tools and materials
Materials used in the project:
Tools used in the project:
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How to build a simple raised garden bed
Raised garden beds give you more convenient and comfortable access to your plants and more control over their growing conditions. Raised beds can also be attractive features in your garden, whether you want to grow vegetables, herbs, flowers or anything else. Experienced member Adam shows you how easy it is with his step-by-step guide How to build a raised garden bed.
More inspiration for raised garden beds
Bunnings Workshop member diy_hausdesigns constructed a Merbau raised garden bed.
Community member moshiach77 made a raised garden bed using corrugated iron for growing vegetables.
Get more ideas from our Top 10 most popular raised garden beds.
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