A French Kitchen (Potager) Garden

If you are keen on growing edibles but aren’t enthusiastic about the look, installation or maintenance of a traditional vegetable garden, consider a French kitchen garden, referred to as a ‘potager’ garden. Leave it to the French to come up with an ornamental designer veggie garden that looks good no matter what time of year it is. What makes potager gardens so appealing and attractive is their symmetrical geometric beds. Within the beds, veggies, fruits, herbs, shrubs and even fruit trees are planted formally to conform to the geometric shaped beds.

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The potager garden replaced a weedy lawn and small veggie bed.

The potager garden extended to the apple tree on the right.

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The Plan. The garden was measured and divided into four quadrants with a square bed in the middle for a focal point.

The beds, referred to as parterres, are usually framed by small hedges such as clipped boxwood, or even herbs such as thyme. Dwarf and espaliered fruit trees, herbs, artichokes and other perennial edibles are not just there to harvest, they are there for their form and elegance.
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Plants are selected not just for their taste, but for their shape and beauty. Edible and non-edible plants are combined for a functional aesthetically pleasing garden.
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I’ve always loved the look and convenience of a potager garden, so when it was obvious we needed more gardens space to grow more veggies, reinventing this French Renaissance style of garden seemed like a fun project.

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Chloe, our very attractive black moggy, loves the new garden.

The budget for this French kitchen garden was minimal, so was the labour. Although we would have loved to use pavers for the paths and stonework or brick to make the geometric beds, we took a more economical route with mulch for the paths and wood for the beds. It isn’t as elegant as a traditional potager garden, but I think the essence still prevails.

Trenches were dug to place the boards.

Wide paths surround identical shaped & sized beds.

The area was measured and a plan was made to accommodate four beds with a central bed in the middle. The beds are exactly the same shape and size. Generous three foot wide paths provide access, convenience and mimic classic potager garden style. 

I'm a firm believer of sheet mulching, so no grass was removed except to install a trench for the wooden frames for each of the beds. The frames were made from 2' x 10" pine boards, treated with an organic wood preservative. We tried to purchase cedar, but due to the pandemic, it was not available at the time. 

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Sheet mulching was used to prevent the grass from growing through the beds without removing the grass.

Beds were filled with soil and the paths were covered with landscape fabric.

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I watered inside the beds, that were still full of grass then laid an inch of newspaper on top. I was careful to overlap the layers of newspapers to totally smother the grass. The newspaper was thoroughly wetted then compost rich soil was added to each bed. 

Initially the paths were covered with a coarse cedar mulch, which was not attractive.

A finer mulch was laid on top of the coarse mulch in keeping with a more refined look.

To make the mulched paths, landscape fabric was pinned down with coat hanger wire that was cut into four inch pieces and curved into U-shapes. Cedar mulch was ordered but when the it was delivered it was too pale, too big and too coarse, and certainly not suitable for what I had in mind. After contemplating it for a while, I bit the bullet and bought bags of non-cedar mulch since I couldn't find any fine cedar mulch locally. The darker and finer mulch was laid on top of the cedar mulch to create a thick 4 inch layer. The cedar should slow down decomposition of the non-cedar mulch (hopefully), prevent the lawn from infiltrating the paths. It will also be nice and soft to walk on. Weeds if they do manage to appear, will be easy pull out. 

With the cedar mulch.

The cedar mulch covered with a finer brown mulch.

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Inexpensive plastic roll edging was used between the mulch and the remaining lawn.

The mulch was extended beyond the parterres to the fence.

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Although the potager beds encompassed only part of the back garden, the mulch was extended to the fence. The whole idea of this project was to reduce maintenance, so keeping small strips of grass wouldn't work. Extending the mulch made a more generous garden, which incorporated the two large lilacs, that now are more noticeable and are more of a feature than just background noise. 

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A petite bistro set to view le jardin.

An arbour acts as an entrance to the garden. A climbing rose is added to each side of the arbor to add colour, blossoms and fragrance.

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Marigolds surround one bed that holds peppers, broccoli, cauliflower and Swiss chard. The rose on the arbour is called Tropical Lightning.

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The layers of the garden accents the central square.

Newly planted lettuce.

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In September the vine tomatoes hang on to the arbor for support.

Kale, kale and kale with some more kale.

The centre is accented by a tall planter filled with a draceana and petunias. Herbs mixed with red salvias surround the base.

Tomato plants fill up one of the parterres.

Part of the herb square include parsley at the rear, variegated sage in front, basil on the right and red annual salvia for colour and for the bees.

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A rear side view of the garden.

From above the central square become a dominant feature.

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On one side of the arbor is the delicate 'Bathsheba', a climbing David Austin rose that is sweetly scented.

On the other side of the arbor is the very robust and floriferous large flowered scented climber 'Tropical Lightning'.

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The garden was designed so the arbor frames the blue planter in the centre.