Potager 101

Potager: A Potager garden is no mere vegetable patch—with a perfect blend of aesthetics and utility, it's a stylish garden offering both edible and visual delights. The fruits, flowers, herbs, and vegetables you grow and harvest there will feed you and your family—and your spirits. (Inspired definition from here.)

You've got to start somewhere, but this is what I am hoping our front yard veggie garden could one day look like:

Pretty, no? I love that it doesn't scream veggie garden at you, but if you look close, you can see the yummy stuff mixed in with the ornamentals. Both gardens are by Michelle Derviss, a Marin-based landscape architect that you can read more about here.

She bordered both gardens in boxwood to define the space, mixing in edibles and decorative plants around the gravel walkways to create beautiful yet functional front-yard gardens. I really love how both pics have a plotted plant in the center for some vertical visual interest. I can almost picture a bench off to one side. You can definitely pick up on the English kitchen garden roots that these potager gardens grew out of. (Pun intended.)

This idea of taking back the front yard is gaining momentum. Many landscape architects are urging Americans to rethink the traditional lawn as front yard, including Fritz Haeg, whose "Edible Estates" program is discussed both in the link above and the resources below.

Resources:
I still have to dig into many of these links and books (the puns just keep on coming, I tell ya!), but I have skimmed them and am dying to find the time to really educate myself.

This article is my favorite that I have run across so far on this growing trend: http://www.chow.com/food-news/54388/eat-your-lawn/

Here are some other sites I have been perusing in the last couple days:

• http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/potager/msg0823435124784.html?16
• http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/potager/msg0823435124784.html?16
• http://homesteadrevival.blogspot.com/2010/06/potager-gardens.html
• http://www.parisiennefarmgirl.com/search/label/Gardening

Lastly, here's some books I would love to get my gardening gloves on:

Amazon.com might just be getting a small chunk of my paycheck this month. These are by no means an exhaustive list of resources. That said, I would *love* to check out any other resources or ideas you have, so drop me a comment if you feel so inclined.

Where Does Your Vegetable Garden Grow?

I ask only because ours grows in the front yard. It's unconventional, I know. We decided to plant our tomato crop and other summer staples in the front yard for myriad reasons: one, it's our largest yard; two, there are no dogs to mess with it; three, it gets the most sun; and four, there is actually soil instead of concrete/wood like the back and side yards. Before planting, we worried that our neighbors (some of whom are quite old and set in their ways), would find the tomato stakes an eyesore. Truth is, they still might; but we are quite happy with the finished product.

It's a vast improvement on the front yard, which is pretty darn sad. Here it is the day we first came to tour our house.

Our little organic garden is off the screen to the left, but it pretty much looks like the terraced area to the right. (I really need to get better at taking before pictures!) Trust me, it's far better than the weeds that were taking over before.

Here's another view from the house looking out onto the street.

The stakes are for our sugar snap peas, the middle row is "Fire Red" lettuce, punctuated by an artichoke at the end...

and the last row to the left are five different varieties of tomatoes.

(All are from McShane's Nursery in Salinas, for those local folks out there.)

We still have the zucchini and some herbs (basil, cilantro, chives, and parsley) to plant in the side yard. I'll share pics when we get there.

The stakes were meant to model the staked garden at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, but since I didn't have a picture, and I did not find the one below until that night, I was working from memory.

We didn't quite get it right (the stakes I was hoping to replicate are on the left, all perfectly identical), but I am looking at it as an excuse to get down there for a visit instead of beating myself up.

This garden will not be a permanent fixture. We really need to redo the retaining wall that is falling apart - *hopefully* this summer - and settle upon a landscape design. We know we want one retaining wall instead of the terraced look we have going on now, but we are not sure if we want to keep the stairs where they are or move them towards the driveway. (We need to look at more pics and sit down and really hammer out or vision. I will share the inspiration pic that we have been coming back to, but if you have any resources, send them my way!)

But one thing we are seriously excited about is creating a portager, a garden that mixes edibles in with ornamentals. I like to think of it as a discrete veggie garden. I am so amped on this trend in landscaping that I will be back tomorrow (and likely Wednesday) to share some pics and resources that have us ready to rip up the front yard and replant. There is a lot out there on front yard vegetable gardens; cynics, get ready, and those ready to embrace this movement, get excited!