The Best Small Space Planters For Growing Your Own Food

Hadley Court readers, I have to tell you that up until recently, my version of Farm To Table Eating and Farm to Table Gardening looked like the picture above 🙂

I have had my own eyes opened, though, recently, thanks to one dear friend and also thanks to the beautiful and informative posts this week of 2 of Hadley Court’s 4 co-writers, Kim Shaver and Lynda Quintero-Davids, regarding this huge movement towards authentic, sustainable living, based on fresh food, slow flowers and beautifully made products using local sourcing whenever possible.

And now it’s my turn today to write on this subject, so, since I live in a pretty 2 bedroom apartment with an 8′ x 8′ foot outdoor front patio area, I thought I’d explore kitchen and vegetable gardening solutions for smaller spaces today, in case some of you live in similar smaller spaces, too. There has to be a more elegant solution for small space planters than the picture below, right?

So, let me share with you what I’ve found, which is quite a lot..and quite wonderful!

But first, a little backstory.

Some of you know I went on vacation recently to NYC to see a very good friend of mine, Gloria Battista-Collins, who is well known in the Hudson Valley area for people who want the most beautiful, locally grown, organic flower arrangements for their weddings or events. I credit Gloria for opening my eyes, first, to the beauty of organic gardens and the benefits of eating healthy foods. We had quite a long talk while I was there about how eating well and living a healthier lifestyle was part of what I needed to do in my own life. One look at Gloria, who is in her 50’s, and you can see that she practices what she preaches. Gloria has an Instagram feed which is very popular and the pictures below are two that she’s recently posted to it.

She and her husband have 2 young sons at home and she cooks fresh for them almost every day. Here is a picture of potatoes just blooming in, while waiting for her kale to come in, by the back door of her garden.

You may remember this arrangement of Gloria’s from Kim Darden Shaver’s beautiful Farm Fresh Style post, here. These flowers were all grown organically in Gloria’s own garden. If you’d like to see more, search the tag: #slowflowers.

So, even though I’d love to have a large garden like Gloria’s , I can’t, and I also don’t have the time. So, in case this is you, too, Hadley Court readers, here are the small space vegetable gardening solutions I’ve found for you, and for me, too.

THE KIGA KITCHEN GARDEN

I saw this in person when I attended ICFF, the International Contemporary Furniture Fair, on that same vacation a few weeks ago in NYC. Instead of a lot of text, I will share with you the link to INHABITAT’s wonderful blog on this great product, from HURBZ, that has won awards. At $399.00 for all 4 pieces, I think this is a great buy. Click here for it.

This picture, below, gives you a sense of its small scale, relative to other outdoor furnishings. It is a wonderful solution and comes packaged prettily, too, making it a great housewarming gift.

THE MARINA

a truly tiny solution from a wonderful French company, http://www.forest-style.com/en/.

I don’t know if they import into the USA, or not, but since there are many international readers of Hadley Court, too, I am sharing this excellent European resource. Their catalog is full of every single thing you could ever need to create a charming outdoor vegetable gardening space, including beautiful trellis work and fencing.

From their online catalog, a screenshot of their children’s mini-vegetable garden box. Is anything more precious than this picture?

THE TOWER GARDEN

A state of the art vertical aeroponic garden that lets you grow any fruit or vegetable or flower you want, using no soil and 90% less water. The perfect choice for any patio or deck where space is limited. I’ve seen these in person and they are beautiful!

Price? 525.00 and click, here, if you’d like one.

THE CHALKBOARD HERB PLANTER

For really limited spaces, I fell in love with this hanging, chalkboard paint covered herb planter, available through Williams -Sonoma, here. It’s $145 and shipping is free. I thought this would also make an ideal wedding gift for couples in apartments or small homes who enjoy cooking with fresh herbs or seniors who have a hard time bending over. Do you agree? It also comes in different sizes. See below.

The different sizes.

Also from Williams -Sonoma, the VegTrug brand of raised vegetable gardens is below. The light on the veggies in this picture below captivated me, but the VegTrug that really works for small spaces is below this picture, and it comes in both a small and medium size.