Vertical Gardening Part 1

Growing in the city can be very hard. With limited space and the limitations of condos or apartments, is it still possible to grow significant quantities of food? The answer is yes! Up on Collingwood Neighbourhood House, the garden workshop team that meets on Wednesdays, have turned an ugly wooden wall, and a useless toy kitchen into a beautiful vertical garden! 

Maximizing and creating growing space, our little system consists of: strawberries, thyme, lemon balm, chives, and cilantro. Of course, some space has been left for seeding vegetables such as lettuce and flowers.







Before:

After:




What we did:

For the plants in the shelves, we used old plastic containers that came with the salad, used for community lunches. To our surprise, they were a perfect fit for the holes in the shelves, so all we did was staple gun the containers to the toy kitchen. In order to prevent everything from falling out, we folded the lids of the plastic containers in half and stapled them down, creating a pocket. Finally, we drilled several holes in the containers and wooden shelves to allow for proper drainage.

On the side, we used chicken wire and bent it in a way as to create a rain gutter. We then stapled it to the wall and lined it with landscaping cloth so that it could hold the soil.

Thinking about all the cool and creative ways to grow in small places and maximize space is what I think is the funnest part about gardening! So stay tuned for more ways to grow food differently!