DIY Raised Garden Bed Ideas to Transform Your Garden Space
A raised garden bed does so much more than provide a home for your vegetables. It helps bring structure, design, and personality to your garden space. Our DIY raised garden bed ideas will answer your questions on what is possible in your garden and give you inspiration aplenty. Each and every space in your garden is dripping in potential. Packed full of inspiration and ideas from Hometalkers who have grafted and built from the ground up, this guide helps you to plan more than just a season’s worth of produce. Follow their lead and create something wonderful today.
Make A Standard Raised Garden Bed
Pallet wood is very versatile, and using it can minimize the effort required in making a sturdy, inexpensive raised garden bed. When making a DIY raised bed using old pallets, be sure to remove all nails and use only dry-stored wood if using to grow food and produce. This Hometalker simply kept some of the pallets whole, using broken down parts to cover the gaps instead of making the whole raised bed from scratch. Careful consideration of your pallet wood can make it last longer and become a great addition to your homestead. Get tutorial here
Shaped Garden Beds
Raised garden beds can be practical garden creations, but they don't have to be square. Whether your garden is flat or landscaped, small or large, a raised garden bed can add space and interest. This Hometalker decided to ditch the rulebook and go for shapes made from cedar wood, which should last 10-15 years. There are no fixed rules on how to make a raised garden bed, and they don’t have to be all right angles either. Make them in triangles and other shapes - because not all gardens are square. Get tutorial here
The Answer To Odd-Shaped Space In Your Garden
A raised garden vegetable bed can bring out the best in your garden, no matter what shape your space is. Convert any corner, shady spot, or bare area in your garden with a cheap raised bed using reclaimed or scrap wood. Even the shadiest of spots in your garden will allow veggies to grow. Little Homestead in Boise used untreated recycled timber to create a trapezoid shaped bed, but you can use new wood to suit your style. Get tutorial here
Convert A Raised Bed Into A Greenhouse
Extend your growing season by transforming your raised bed into a greenhouse. Living in Norway, Hometalker Christopher had good reason to try and extend his growing season. Using some UV plastic poles and clear plastic sheeting meant he could introduce a liftable lid to his bed and create a greenhouse. Adding a tropical climate to his Scandinavian mountain garden will (hopefully) allow his peppers to ripen to perfection. Get tutorial here
Decking With Built-In Raised Bed Planters
When it’s time to replace the old decking, why not add some raised beds into your design? New decking on its own can be transformative for your garden. Putting in some raised beds as well like Mary Jane Dunford did can add the barrier between outdoor living space and the garden. Using the same cedar wood decking material for the raised planter beds as well completes a contemporary urban decking look. Get tutorial here
Raised Beds With Added Zen
Not all the plants in your beds love endless sunshine; adding sun-shade panels can give them some respite. Using lengths of cedar wood planks above their beds, SteveAndrea Bourne added an entirely new concept to their garden. These aren’t just any raised beds anymore, they are shady areas for evening drinks or a hasty retreat from the sun. The finished look lends itself to the atmosphere of a Japanese pagoda. Get tutorial here
Raised Beds For Sloping Gardens
For any garden that isn’t flat, a raised bed can bring order to planting and growing. Sloping gardens can often either drain too quickly or get waterlogged. Building raised beds help to restore uniformity in conditions and to ensure even water distribution. Elevated raised garden beds can be built in situ or transported from your workshop. The most important tools is your shovel for digging out terraces and your level to make sure it’s... well, level! Get tutorial here
Raised Beds For New Builds
New-build houses can be left with empty gardens. A stone-raised bed can provide an immediate contemporary design to your new outdoor space. Hometalker Honeybear Lane needed to fill their garden with something interesting while waiting for their trees to mature. They built a bed from stone that matched the style and color scheme of their urban surroundings. The look was completed using paving base, paving sand, and reclaimed stone bricks to create an easy-build garden feature and privacy screen. Get tutorial here
Raised Bed With Detachable Cold Frame
A great way for gardeners to extend their gardening season is to convert their raised bed by adding a cold frame. Working just like a greenhouse, Three Dogs In A Garden added a cold frame to grow seeds earlier in the season, protect the plants (presumably from dogs), and extend the growing season by a few weeks too. The clever thing about this bed is it can be transformed into a cold frame and back again in less than an hour. Get tutorial here
Hugelkultur: An Eco-Friendly Raised Garden Bed
Hugelkultur garden beds are a different breed of eco-friendly raised bed. Not only is this a great way of recycling old tree trimmings, logs, and cuttings from your garden, it allows you to naturally store nutrients and water to feed your growing plants, herbs, or vegetables. Construction requires all the wood and branch material to be covered in a rich soil before being watered heavily. In a short time, this can produce a sustainable, wild kitchen garden. Get tutorial here
Metal Raised Garden Bed With Trellis
Your raised bed doesn’t just need to contain veggies or flowers. They can be easily combined with a trellis for climbing plants like beans and blackberries. Kerry built this bed with a high trellis, which became both a climbing support for plants as well as a privacy screen from neighbors. Instead of just wood, she also managed to add some corrugated metal sheeting too, matching the decor of her BBQ and furniture. Get tutorial here
Adding Geometric Design Flourishes
Even basic, square raised beds can be made into geometric designs that add a real design-aesthetic to your garden. Hometalker Stephen used the same raised bed measurements to create a distinctive feature for his garden. Incorporating a simple notch lap joint to his wood planks, he avoided using any nails or other fixings in this project. What remains is a natural-looking feature planter utilizing a generous balance of space and raised bed. Get tutorial here
Make A Raised Bed For Your School Or Community Garden
If budgets are small, sometimes it pays to get creative when sourcing wood for your raised beds. When Hometalker Little Sprouts Learning wanted to build a row of raised beds for a preschool garden, budget constraints were at the forefront of design and planning. Using an old stretch of donated privacy fence allowed multiple beds to be made at a fraction of the cost of using new wood. This is a great blueprint for any community garden project. Get tutorial here