Breaking Ground on our Vegetable Gardens in Richmond, VA

So we've recently announced (here and here) that we are starting an exciting new vegetable garden at our Show Gardens in Richmond, VA and we are breaking ground today!

Before I start to show you pictures of the process, let me explain a little bit about our show gardens so that we are all on the same page:

This is an illustrated drawing of our Show Gardens (with some computer-generated markings described below) designed by Tom Stuart, our long-time designer on staff here at Robbins Landscaping. The area outlined in red is the section that we installed in the summer of 2009. This is what it looks like (during the growing season!):

The letters below correspond with the letters on the plan above just to help you get a sense of the garden layout
A

B

C

D

E

The area outlined in yellow has not been installed according to this plan. In fact, it is currently a grassy patch that looks a little something like this:

So after much discussion on the best, most exciting way to use this space, we decided to install a vegetable garden there! (In the yellow-outlined space.)

Tom got to work planning out the design of the beds and we now have a concept for the vegetable garden!

Here's a little video of Tom explaining his thought process to you:



Now for those of you that are at work and can't watch this video, Tom basically explains that he is planning to construct 6 raised beds for our vegetable garden. The beds will not, at this point, be bordered by stone or timber but will be rectangular mounds of rich soil that will soon be filled with thriving vegetable plants! We plan to leave grass walkways between each bed to allow for easy maintenance and harvesting. The layout of the rectangular beds is in such a way that the grass paths will align with the sidewalk that leads to our office front door as well as to our existing patio.

The challenges that we know we will face are "critters;" we know that deer and rabbits live near our office and are pretty sure that woodchucks might be a threat as well. We haven't determined our best practice for deterring these critters, but we will let you know what we decided to do- and what does and doesn't work for us! After all, a large part of why we have a Show Garden is to test plants and ideas so that we can suggest great options for our clients!

So now that everyone has a good idea of the lay of the land, I'll be back soon with posts of the progress! Here's a sneak peak for you to see what exciting things are going on: