G'day spider66

My version of a potager is a cross between squarefoot gardening and a chaotic cottage garden with the lettuces lurking and the peas doing a bolt through the Other Vegetation.

Personally, the most important part is the access - and hard paths certainly save a huge amount of work. Pine bark or mulch from the tree pruning fellas packs down pretty well as a path. Gravel - especially a mixed chip size - small with 10mm - gives good footing and is ok for pushing a barrow. It seems to be slow to make a seed bed for weeds, too. Leave enough room in the paths for getting barrowloads of compost around easily. I laid mine out roughly, then 'drove the course' before I made it permanent. Plenty of elbow room between me and the hedge, too.

Plan your work flow and your crop rotation ahead so delicate things are not being left in the shade of big stuff, and the winter vegies aren't at the far end.

I use bricks around mine. One thing I would say is - make sure the couch grass and the buttercups are dealt to first otherwise there's a big upheaval to get those roots out.

A plus about the bricks is that they can form a suntrap and release heat into the garden. With the weather we've been having that's a plus!

If you have the room and the bricks - make the borders wide. Things can sprawl without blocking the paths; containers can be safely perched; it gives a clear line if you're planning to use box edging or similar. (Don't think I would. I'd rather use chives or lavender - something edible that improves with regular pruning/harvesting. Something I don't have to high step over...)

If you do a check on the square foot gardening forum in the main forum area - have a look at tips and hints for vertical gardening, there. I've long loved those delicious obelisk thingies - all woven and painted - but I'm not the world's greatest with a hammer, so it usually comes down to manuka stakes or galv pipe. NOT artistic at all ;-( .

Plant material - King's Seeds catalogue and a small glasshouse would be useful - to get the diversity and range of edibles with attitude, IMO.

For pictures - there's Diana Anthony's garden in Northland; back issues of the NZ Gardener; and Monty Don from the UK. He may not be their most popular garden personality - but there are some good ideas in his books. Could be in the library. You might also want to post on the UK forum. They don't seem to mind incursions from the Antipodes.

In the main area the tomato group are truly fanatical and fascinating. The Canadians are great! - and useful for deep south gardeners. The general vegie group can be helpful, too.

The search function can be really useful and if it can answer anything as vague as 'green bulb' to point me to the pregnant onion plant - well, it's pretty good.

Most posters are polite and friendly - and the few who aren't can be ignored.

Hope you get some great leads for your project.