I guess I have to say that I rather like the "ugly black plastic" edging if it's properly installed. It does a good job of maintaining an edge and if installed right you really don't even see the edging. That said you want to use a good quality edging, not the garbage you pick up at the box stores. You may want to check out the website of the renegade gardener. Somewhere on there I recall reading excellent instructions for installing edging.

buyorsell888, what type of grass do you have in your lawn? To me, that's an important consideration in whether and how to edge around it.

Nice job Flora! That looks great!

Beautiful Flora!! I could definitely pull up a chair and sit there with a cup of coffee in hand looking at your masterpice for hours. :O)

I have lots of rocks and such so some of my gardens intentionally have no rocks or bricks in them or as an edging where they meet the lawn. I use this 1/2 moon 'edger' and create an edge that is about 3 to 4 inches deep. I usually have to do this once a year and that's it. Where the lawn is the cut goes straight down preventing the lawn from heading into the gardens. It's easy and it's fast.

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Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:202980}}

What a beautiful garden, flora, and tiffy's garden is always an inspiration.
I got rid of lawn altogether, lol, and mulch my beds heavily.

We have been trenching our beds the past couple of years, and even with Bermuda grass we've only had to do it once a year. I like trenching because if I change my mind (a frequent occurence...LOL), it is easy to change the shape of the bed.

Wanted to add, though, if I wasn't so indecisive I love the look of Flora's hand-cast stones!!

I use a half-moon edger also, for trench edging. Mine never seem to look as good as everyone else's, lol, but it is fairly easy and quick, needs maintenance about once a year (maybe a quick raking back of soil here and there, especially after a heavy rain) - and another indecisive gardener here, lol, so the trench works for me on that level too!

Flora, your edging is beautiful, but I've always hesitated to do something like that because I figure grass and weeds will creep between the bricks. Do you not have that problem?

I do edge some of my beds with found rocks, especially under trees where trenches may be hard to cut. One time I didn't do that to a new planting of monkshood, and my husband mowed it down. When I asked him about it, the poor guy looked a bit nervous and confused and said, "But... there were no rocks around it. I thought they were weeds!" So now I definitely use rocks where I can't trench-edge, but I find the grass/weeds creep between the rocks too.

:)
Dee

Whie I often admire stone or brick edging in other's gardens, I dislike any edging myself except for raised beds. The plastic or fake wood looks nasty and it is too diffcult to keep weeds and grass from growing through the stone. And I often add to or change the shape of planting beds so any edging just gets in the way.

I use a form of trenching that is common to English borders - just make a clean, vertical cut along the sod 5-6 inches deep and then gently mound/slope the soil back to the planting bed, leaving a gap of 3-4" at the top. This is a very easy chore, needing only to be touched up once or twice a season and that sloped gap is sufficient to catch and hold any mulch you may use.

Flora, could you give me some info on the mold you used and how to make those stones? It looks great!
I am hoping it is cheaper than buying stone/brick edging.

The lawn is a combination of perennial rye grass, fescue, moss and weeds. Nothing that has runners like Bermuda.

DH uses a weed whacker to edge though we have a half moon edger. He chews up over hanging perennials.

He refuses to consider doing away with the lawn. Getting an extra foot of beds all the way around was a huge concession and was in fact, my birthday present. However my birthday is in August and I still don't have my extra planting space.

Flora, love your picture.

I have broken cement used to separate lawn from bed in the back yard and it works well but in the front yard the bed and lawn are level. In back the beds are raised. The front beds have fifteen years worth of trees, shrubs, perennials and bulbs in them so heaping the soil up to make them raised would not work.

I used to do the trench edging but the maintenance became too much work. Over the past couple of years, I've moved to doing something similar to flora's. I use paver bricks with a metal edge between the bricks and lawn to keep the grass out. It has been a real labour-saver for me (although a lot of work to install!) As gardengal says though, it's a PITA to change a bed shape! I had to undo some I had put in the previous year when we made the narrow bed last year that runs along the top of the ditch - not an easy task.
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I started initially with black edging that you have to dig into the ground. I switched to the kind that you put in with lawn staples. HATED THAT.

Now I do the trench thing.... converted my beds to that method last summer, abandoning the black plastic edge.
I don't use a 1/2 moon, rather a tool called "Edge Hound". I like that it has crisp corners.

Here is a link that might be useful: Edge Hound

Given my druthers, I would have a trenched edge, but DH, who does the mowing, hates having the mower wheels drop into the trench. So I use black plastic edging sunk low enough to be hidden by the grass, and inside of that I place a line of bricks for DH to run the mower wheels on. Looks tidy, keeps most of the lawn out of the beds, though I have to tidy up the clover that tries to creep across the brick once or twice a season.

I cut my line/shape in the grass and then cut another line/shape about 4" in parellel to the original cut. I then pull that sod up and flip it upside down on the inside of the grass. That creates a slight build up so the mulch gently overlfows into the trench.

Upfront its a lot of work, but not much maintenance. Just rake some of the mulch back into place in spring.

Depending on the grading and moisture level I do have to clean up the edges once in awhile.

The beauty of this type of edging is its FLEXIBLE! You can easily change or expand the edges.

The black plastic edging is a joke...and the people who use it incorrectly are really the joke. If used properly and set at the proper depth it does a good job.

I used a high quality edging that was more plyable and flat in sheen...alot of work to install that. I then wanted to change the shape...but ended up leaving it because its not flexible to your everchanging design.

I do want to have something flexible because I like to cheat and expand the beds without him knowing. I'm going to work on him to just trench it so I can get away with expansion. He never notices. I've got spots that are well over a foot past the black plastic already as it has sunk down into the ground over the years.

Somehow, he thinks American men must have lawns. Even though he does not care for it properly (I refuse) and it is a mess of moss and weeds. He also thinks it is wrong to have plants block the view of the house from the street. I HATE looking at my neighbor's parked cars etc and would have completely blocked off the view a decade ago if he would have let me. I'd love a private courtyard in front instead of feeling like I am in a fishbowl....We have more yard in front than side or back.

When you cut any size trench for an edge, how do you manage to cut the lawn against the trench edge? On most mowers I've seen, the cutting blades do not cut anything outside of the wheels of the mower, and so the wheels then drop into the trench as stated above, and the result is often a scalping of the cut edge of the lawn. It is not practical to maintain this edge just once a year, as the grass needs to be continually cut or trimmed or it will grow over into the trench, or into the mulch used in the beds.

Thanks for the lovely comments.
Diggerdee - I also use the ugly black edging beside the brick and I usually only have problems with clover creeping over the bricks.
Like others I have tried the trench edging only, but ended up with scalped lawn as others have alluded to.

You can see my bigger cobblestone pattern here with the black edging and some bricks for added contrast.
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Bumblebee - Here is the mold info. I had actually started with the larger cobblestone mold and wanted to keep the same look, so bought this smaller mold. After I pour them and while partially set I cut them in half so each mold will do about 2 feet of edging.

When I get the urge for a new project, I simply cut my new bed edge out with the edger, and then cut 6" inside that line. I then pull up the grass and turn it upside down on the lawn which is becoming flower bed. I then go back and remove the bricks and edging that will be affected. I reroute the black edging, add sand to the 6" trench to get the bricks level with the ground and put in place. I then cover all the grass with newspaper, cardboard and dirt, compost or whatever I can get my hands on.
A new flower bed is born.....
I usually only do this in the spring as the ground is soft and easy to work with then.
Flora

Here is a link that might be useful: 13 in walkmaker mold

jonb, I don't have that problem. I actually guide the wheel of the mower up on the mulch. It trims the grass just fine...I do however hit a piece of mulch occassionally.

I use the black plastic strips. It is set quite deep and is not visible and it almost zero maintenance. I think it must be high quality stuff because it was not difficult to install and it has held up well for nearly ten years and going strong. I only have to pull a few stray bits of grass that creep in when I am working in the beds doing other things. Digging a trench around each bed twice a year is a ton of work. No thanks.

I like that the beds cannot change shape. Before I had edging, the shape of the beds were always moving around and getting ragged and didn't look good. Now I designed really nice curves and they stay looking good.

I still don't get the maintainece part of the trenching.

I haven't had to do anything over the past 3 years for the beds that haven't changed. Are folks using mulch or no mulch? I use a shredded bark so not sure if that has anything to do with it.

The only occasional problem is that dang quack grass shoot that makes its way through the mulch. And of course after heavy rains there are some areas that need the mulch raked back into place.

John4b, a weed-whacker or a clippers is all that is needed to maintain the grass around the trench edge. When I, at least, spoke of maintaining it once a year, I meant the edge/trench itself. Once a year to give it a nice, crisp, sharp edge. For the grass around the edges, a quick once-over with a weed-whacker or clippers after mowing is sufficient.

whaas - are you saying you don't understand the "maintenance part" because you don't do it at all, or you do it more often? I think you mean you don't do it at all. I do it once a year at least to, as I mentioned, give a nice, sharp edge. I find the soil - *and* mulch, which in my case is usually shredded leaves in back, cocoa hulls in front - tends to slip/wash down into the trench over the winter. I will also sometime just use a trowel while weeding to give a quick clean-up of the trench if we've had a lot of rain and there has been some "slippage".

:)
Dee

I would like to install some hard edge because the trench is a lot of maintenance. Weeds get in the trench. The grass grows sideways and has to be string trimmed and the mulch fills the trench when it rains. That said, I still prefer the trenched look best by far. Every year or so it has to totally be dug again.
I expect when I do some kind of cobblestone edging, I will still have to round up the edge and string trim the grass against the stone.

I don't understand it in the sense of having the same issues as others mentioned.

One person said they don't trench because they have to maintain it 2x a year. Antoher person said they have to redig the trench every year or so.

I've used the trench method and haven't had to do any maintainence except for what I listed above.

Here is an example of a bed that hasn't changed or needed redigging for 2 years as shown. You can see (maybe) I started to change the flow starting on the right side.

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Gardening involves both aesthetics and maintenance - can't get away from it :-) How one weighs off that balance is certainly a personal choice. Personally, the inflexibility and questionable aesthetics of most structured lawn edgings is a no-brainer against the occasional maintenance of trenching. And by occasional, I mean trimming back the longer growing grass along the trenched edge using an edging tool, hand trimmers or a string trimmer once or twice a season. No big deal.

Sorry to jump in at the end of a long interesting conversation but...

I can't get much to grow in the non-garden areas-- except medic and plantain and other weeds-- and I really don't care about grass enough to do the soil remediation, grub removal, and grass seeding that would be necessary.

The "grass" is pathetic and never really needs mowing, so a mowing strip isn't needed. I'm constantly expanding the beds, so I don't want to install anything too permanent.

I've been trying to plant low-growing plants to edge the beds? Does anyone do this? What plants do you use?

- Bev

I used a cut edge (with a gravel French drain under the grass) until recently:

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Recently, we created a variation on a French drain, but didn't lay grass sod on top. We also used a perforated pipe (in a sock) below the rock. We used concrete edgers to keep the rock out of the garden.

This was necessary to handle torrential rains. We've also found that it is wide and stable enough for a person to walk on, roll a wheelbarrow and run the mower wheel on it.

Additionally, since the drain is filled with sharp rock for 1 foot below the decorative rock, it has been turning around the tunneling rodents that try to get into the garden from the meadow.

This was a DIY project.

Cameron

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I'm one who found the trench edge too much maintenance. To keep it looking nice and crisp, it needed work three times each season or soil washing down from the beds started to fill the trench and blur the edges. My case is a bit unusual since I'm disabled and use a walker for mobility. The trench was also becoming a hazard - if I walked too close to the edge and any of the the walker wheels dropped into the trench, I was apt to fall. The brick edging was a great relief for both maintenace and safety. We waited until we thought the beds were likely to stay pretty much stable in size and shape before we did the brick edge. We changed one the next year, which was a bit of a pain. The other thing I do - mainly in the backyard - is put a mulch path between the bed and the lawn so the grass is nowhere near the bed. The grass seems less inclined to invade the path and easier to remove - or mulch over - if it does.

whaas, beautiful photo. Do you have a closer shot so we can really see the edging?

woodyoak, I have to admit to sometimes stepping into the edge also, and almost falling over! I can twist my ankle walking on the flat driveway (and often do - my neighbors must think I'm drunk half the time!) so I do need to watch for that edge, so you bring up a good safety point.

Cameron, that's a very interesting system you've got there. I'm especially intrigued by the idea of the sharp rock a foot down, deterring critters. Definitely something to think about. But it must make it more difficult to expand a bed, no? And do you have trouble keeping the decorative rock out of the grass? I imagine if the mower picks up and flings one of those it could be lethal. Have you ever thought of having two rows of edging with the rock in between?

:)
Dee

Sort of...

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Dee - the garden bed will not ever be expanded deeper (it's too large already if you notice the top photo!).

My husband uses a riding mower and it completely clears the rock, but he is still careful to go in one direction along the edge so that if a rock is slung, it goes out into the open 2 acre meadow and not into the house windows!

The rock stays in the trench. The sharp rock below the round rock holds it in place. The stray rocks in the photo are from the workers (us) shoveling the rock to fill the trench.

someone mentioned that the mower kept running into the trench. I had the same problem on my last house and I was using a normal small mower. I could not understand why people like the trenching method.

I then moved to 5 acres and bought a ridding mower. It cuts well past the wheels and trenching work quite well.

Thanks whaas! Thanks Cameron!

:)
Dee

I got him to agree to the trench method and I did sneak a few more inches but....the lawn grew so fast that I lost six inches in some areas where I had planted and was watering. So, heavy contractor grade ugly black plastic edging went in last weekend. I did manage to get more growing space by fine tuning the curves of the lawn but he actually came out and threw a fit when he saw sod in the wheel barrow. He never cares how many plants I buy and willingly goes to Butchart Gardens when we are in BC but he drives me crazy over his stupid lawn.