Tips and Tricks to Start a Vertical Garden

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A vertical garden consists of any arrangement of plants on a vertical, instead of a typical horizontal, surface. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, is a remarkable example of this type of gardening. Many people in urban areas have limited space to grow plants, want to soften the effect of a stark and imposing wall, grow plants for food or bring an area of green space into their apartment or office. The popularity of vertical gardening in the United States has been on a marked upswing for the last decade for all these reasons.

Vertical gardens go by many different names – living wall, green wall, moss wall, green facade, and landscape wall to name a few. Whatever you choose to call it, the distinguishing feature of a vertical garden is that the plants grow on or in an upright, vertical structure instead of in rows on the ground.

Are There Different Styles of Vertical Gardens?

Vertical gardens come in a variety of styles and planting methods. If you are thinking about a vertical garden for your space, here are a few different ways to put one together. One thing to remember is that there is no right or wrong way to make or plant a vertical garden. If the plants are stacked vertically and you can build it, you can make it work.

Container

One easy option for a vertical garden is the container style. This simply means that plants in containers – pots, boxes, or planters – are attached to a wall in rows and stacked up one over the other. The most important thing to think about is how you will support or hang the pots and planters. The structure has to be strong enough to hold the weight of the soil, the container, and the plant, itself.

Most of the typical supports employed in vertical gardens are wood posts, metal stakes, and rigid PVC pipes. You can also hang the plants from trellises, tripods, arches, or pergolas. Some people have even used gutters, wire cages, netting, and 2-liter soda bottles to construct their vertical gardens. The only limit is your imagination.

Pocket

A pocket garden consists of a section of canvas with rows of “pockets” made out of felt or canvas. The plants are tucked into each pocket across and down. One of the advantages of a pocket style garden is that pre-made pocket planters are readily available for purchase on the web or at your local gardening center. If you’re not handy or don’t have materials on hand to make your own structure, all you need to do is find a free wall to nail or hang the pockets on. You can also attach the pocket planters to each other and arrange them across a low wall or across and down a tall vertical surface. Pocket planters are a great solution for growing smaller, decorative plants and herbs.

Wooden Pallet

Wooden pallets, which you can often find for free in urban areas or purchase at Walmart and home renovation stores, are also a great option if you have limited space for plants. We even know some chefs who grow their own herbs in vertical pallet gardens right outside the kitchen door for convenience.The trick to creating a pallet garden is to staple landscaping fabric to the back, bottom and sides of the pallet. Once that’s done, you fill the pallet with soil and plant in the openings between the slats.

What Are the Benefits of a Vertical Garden?

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Urban planners, architects, and scientists are constantly discovering new advantages to vertical gardening. We list a few here:

Maximize Space

If you have a limited area for a traditional garden plot, you can increase your growing space by gardening vertically. Apartment dwellers and folks with tiny outdoor areas have found that they can even grow their own vegetables in very small spaces.

Smaller Growing Area

While this may sound like a drawback if one of the goals is to maximize your space, a smaller growing area can be of great benefit to people with limited mobility who still want to keep up their gardening skills. Plants are easier to reach off the ground, and tasks like fertilizing, pruning, and harvesting are more convenient and less of a workout for your back. People with lots of kids or pets who take over the backyard space also enjoy keeping their garden in a compact area where there is less possibility for the plants to get trampled.

Improve Air Quality

In outdoor, urban areas where smog and heat effect the plants (build-up of heat in densely populated, metropolitan areas), it becomes problematic; vertical gardens mitigate these effects, help to clean the air of pollutants, and offset the carbon footprint of people and fuel emissions. Indoor gardens remove VOCs and other harmful toxins like formaldehyde and benzene and help to improve interior air quality.

Create a Sound and Visual Barrier

Sound can be a problem for people who live in high-traffic areas or noisy apartment buildings. A wall of plants is a natural barrier that not only reduces the effects of constant noise, but it also works as a great solution for disguising and covering up boxy air conditioners and unattractive outdoor structures.

Energy Savings

Vertical gardens protect both interior and exterior walls from the elements. Vegetation on walls helps to cool buildings in the summer and insulate them from the cold in the winter which will reduce costs and save on fuel consumption.

Improve Focus and Mood

Before you get started constructing your garden, it’s a good idea to consider what kind of plants will work best in the space you have available. Succulents, vegetables, ferns, and plants with soft, green stems all adapt well to vertical growth. Woody plants like trees, shrubs, and some vines have rigid stems, so they grow parallel to the floor instead of flowing down.

Creative Vertical Gardening Tips

Now that we’ve covered the different types of vertical gardens and some of their benefits, let’s get started here with some simple ideas and things to consider as you get ready to create your own vertical patch. Remember, the only thing that differentiates a vertical garden from a regular garden is the plants are one over the other instead of next to each other in the ground.

Choose Your Plants

Shade or Sun?

Choose your plants according to how much sun they will get. A basic rule of thumb is to choose all-sun or all-shade plants that have similar growth rates. If you put a slow growing plant next to a one that grows much faster, the aggressive plant will take over and shade out the other one. Also, don’t plant bigger plants above smaller ones for the same reason.

Water

Plants grown in containers tend to dry out much more than their counterparts in the ground. Think about adding extra mulch to the soil to compensate and make sure you have an adequate source readily available.

Preparation

Some experts believe that you should let the plants grow horizontally for a while before you put them on their sides to grow. So, if you’re using a pallet type structure for your garden, let the plants grow flat and establish their roots before you tip the pallet or container on its side.

Reuse and Recycle

Some of the most creative and fun vertical gardens are constructed from re-purposed items. Here are a few ideas on how to integrate things you probably have lying around the house into your new, green space.

Ladders – prop a regular ladder up against a wall and hang your plants from the rungs or open up a folding ladder and use the steps as shelves
Hanging shoe organizers – hang one up on a sunny wall and use the pockets to grow herbs and small plants
Two-liter soda bottles – cut off the top or open up a hole in the side, pack them with soil, and hang them vertically or horizontally along the wall
Rain gutters – nail them to a wooden surface, fill them with dirt and use them to plant rows of greenery
Old shelving – attach your old closet shelves to a wall or put that old bookshelf to new use

Enjoy the Results