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Your Garden — Gardening Help

	Return to Main Tips & Techniques List

Gardening Tips & Techniques

You Can Do It: Building a Raised-bed Garden

GROWING YOUR OWN!
Help your family make the connection between the food they eat and where it comes from. Chicago Botanic Garden President Sophia Siskel and Manager of School and Community Gardening Eliza Fournier show how easy it is for anyone to make a raised-bed garden as a two-hour weekend project.

Steps to Success

If you follow these steps, you will be on your way to having a successful
raised-bed garden:

Get ready

• Click here for a handy materials list.
• Do your research. Read up on the subject.
  Hint: The Lenhardt Library of the Chicago Botanic Garden is a good starting point.
• Consult with experts, if desired.
• Visit some completed raised beds. Hint: Excellent examples may be found in the Garden's Regenstein Fruit & Vegetable and Buehler Enabling gardens and Green Youth Farm.

Get Set

• Choose a location with good sun and accessible water for your bed. Hint: Fruit and vegetable gardens require at least six hours of sunlight per day for maximum productivity, and need lots of water.
• Decide what materials you'll need to build your raised bed.
• Purchase the materials. Hint: Call the lumber yard and hardware stores to preorder; that way your purchases will be waiting for you. You may be able to arrange for the lumber to be delivered.
• Arrange materials on a tarp or dropcloth on your lawn so that they are easily visible and centrally located.

And Go!

Establish a foundation.

• Lay out the lumber to outline the raised bed. Insert landscape fabric if necessary.
  Hint: Make sure the timbers alternate joints at the frame ends for added strength.
• Make sure outline is level. Hint: Use a level and move soil as necessary to even up the lumber.
• Check the edges to make sure they're square. Hint: Use a triangle measure.

Secure the timbers.

• Toenailing — use a hammer to drive nails at a 30-degree angle into the end seams in opposite directions, securing the timbers together. Do this at each end on all four corners of your frame. Hint: It's helpful to have two people — one to hammer, and one to hold the lumber steady to prevent shifting.
• Spiking — Use a mallet or sledgehammer to drive spikes through one layer of lumber into another, securing layers vertically. Hint: As with toenailing, another person can help keep lumber steady.

Create a grid for planting.

• Stake out a grid for plants, using books on square-foot gardening, such as those by Mel Bartholomew, for reference.
• Add soil and plant! Hint: You may arrange with a local garden center to have soil delivered.

CONGRATULATIONS!
You have taken the first steps toward building your raised-bed garden!