In 2024 we are embarking on a journey of gardening in a townhouse. This is a big adjustment for us as we recently moved from a house that had a huge garden to townhouse with a much smaller outdoor space.
While these outdoor garden spaces are much smaller, it doesn’t mean that we can’t grow a garden! Carefully planned garden spaces can achieve beautiful and unique gardens and can be effective in growing lots of plants for food or simply for general enjoyment.
Read on down below to learn about the THREE unique garden spaces that we are planning to create at our townhouse. You can also check out my YouTube video down below for additional photos and plans!
Kitchen Garden Plans
Our kitchen garden will be located in our backyard just off of our kitchen in our townhouse. This is where we are going to grow all of our fruits, vegetables and herbs. As a recipe developer and someone who generally likes to cook, there’s nothing like cooking with fresh produce from the garden. I am very happy that this garden will be super close and accessible when I am cooking.
This will be the largest of all our our garden spaces in our new home, and will require the most work in terms of building and set up. This garden will also be the largest part of our garden plans for 2024.
Setting this garden up will include:
- Building cedar raised garden beds: We are planning to build two L-shaped garden beds on the current lawn area to have more space to grow our fruits, vegetables, and herbs. Cedar is the best wood to use to build raised garden beds since it takes a long time to rot compared to cheaper woods like pine, maple, or fir. Luckily, with our last garden makeover in our old home, we know how to complete this project easily.
- Removing brick garden and moving garden chairs to another garden area: We currently have a brick-lined garden that is directly in the ground that will need to be removed. This is where one of our L-shaped garden beds will go. We also need to clear a bit of space on our patio. So we are going to move our two patio chairs to another garden area (scroll down below to see where these will be living!).
- Installing trellis: I loved our metal trellis that we had in our previous garden so I am planning to purchase the same one (Panacea Classic Finial Arch/Arbour from Canadian Tire) and install it in our new garden. This will be great for vertical gardening and will save us some space in the garden.
Cut Flower Garden
After having a cut flower garden in our previous home, I knew I had to find a space to create this again in our new townhouse and in our garden plans for 2024. I love growing my own flowers for flower arranging and just to grow specific varieties of flowers that are not commonly available.
With the small front yard space that we had at our townhouse, I found a way to strategically grow a cut flower garden in this area. To easily access the flowers for harvesting, maintenance, and watering, I am going to use a “keyhole” design. This will allow me to have a short pathway to walk into the centre of the yard and be able to reach all the flowers.
While the front yard is quite small, I think that this is a super effective way to grow a cut flower garden. I will be growing several dahlias, cosmos, cornflowers, amaranth, and hopefully a few sunflowers. I am also planning to add in my dream hydrangea that I have ordered to be delivered in the spring!
Mediterranean Garden
If two gardens weren’t enough, we are going to be creating a third garden space at our townhouse. This will be a Mediterranean garden that will be located on our balcony that is just off of our bedroom. I never thought I would have a garden right next to our bedroom, so when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped at the chance to do this!
The Mediterranean garden will consist of various plants from Mediterranean origin including an olive tree, a fig tree, rosemary, and lavender. All of these plants are relatively drought tolerant and do not require a lot of water once established. This is key for this area as we do not have a hose hook-up on this balcony and I will have to water these plants using a watering can.
To really achieve that Mediterranean feel, I have been collecting various terracotta pots to grow all of these plants in. I have amassed a good collection so far of pots in all different shapes and sizes. I can’t wait to fill them up with some gorgeous plants in a few months!
While I was a bit nervous about having a garden in our new home, I cannot wait to begin gardening in a townhouse. I am very excited to execute these plans this spring and share my gardening journey and my tips and tricks for gardening in a small space. Follow along on my journey here on the blog and my social media channels!