GARDENING IN THE CITY LOOKING UP
Make the most out of small areas by planting versatile vertical beds
In dense urban areas in Canada and the U.S., homeowners are maximizing small outdoor living areas through clever design, says Joe Raboine, who has specialized in outdoor design and construction for over 18 years and now oversees the internal design department for hardscape company Belgard.
“A lot of retirees and empty nesters are moving into these areas,” Raboine says. “They’ve had these large suburban yards and want to do things like garden in their outdoor living spaces.”
It’s amazing what can be achieved in small spaces, he adds.
“A lot of urban yards are 300 or 400 square feet,” he says. “It’s just thinking differently about how that space is being used. On a suburban lot, you might have separate areas for cooking and dining and a fireplace or sitting and conversation area, and in these urban environments you can accomplish all these things with clever design.”
Green walls have been a huge trend in home design over the past five years and now vertical gardens are surging in popularity, he says.
“There’s lots of opportunities to integrate raised beds and planters and also make them functional seating wise,” he says. “So you could have one adjacent to a fire pit, for example, and then vertically. A lot of the time you’re able to go up six or eight feet, creating these vertical gardens that are essentially comprised of, let’s say, three to five horizontal troughs that could be any size or depth.”
Like all smart small-space design, vertical gardens work well in these spaces because they’re multi-functional, Raboine says.
“You’re able to grow a tremendous variety of herbs and peppers and tomatoes,” he says, “but they also create a privacy screen, so there’s just different ways to think about design that can really accomplish a lot in a small space.”
Vertical gardens are also in sync with the farm-to-table food movement, says Raboine.
“You need some fresh basil, you just reach over and grab it and add it to your cooking.”
Vertical gardens will dry out faster than regular garden beds because they can be exposed to more sun and wind. Raboine recommends installing simple drip irrigation systems if you travel a lot or lack the time required to tend to a garden.
“You have it set up on a timer,” he says. “And these systems are fairly inexpensive to incorporate if you’re building out a space.”
Sustainability is increasingly front of mind in urban garden design, and it’s reflected in the products used and plants chosen, he adds.
“I don’t know if it’s just a general awareness, or driven by millennials but there’s definitely an interest in sustainability, and you can do it on a lot of different levels.”
Water management is the first place Raboine starts. Belgard produces lines of paving bricks that absorb all the water that lands on them, allowing it to seep back into the ground instead of running into storm drains.
People are also thinking more sustainably when it comes to the plants they’re choosing for their urban gardens.
“There’s definitely a shift away from just ornamental plants to native plants that are droughttolerant and obviously evolved in those areas to withstand the sun and wind and are beneficial to the local pollinators, which are in decline in a lot of these areas — bees, and butterflies and things,” he says.
“And on top of that, the whole organic slow food movement ties into vertical gardens, because it’s like ‘hey if we’re going to plant something, why don’t we plant something we can eat or that benefits local wildlife.’ I think all these things are tremendously positive as a whole.”