How do you design your garden knowing that you will have vines galore?  How do you ensure that its both appeasing to the eye and allows you to easily maintain it?

For the past few years my garden has always overgrown the boundaries of the raised beds with the cucumbers, squash, zucchini and watermelon vines just everywhere.  When that happens, it becomes much more complex to mow around and just have a clean looking space.

This year I decided that I would figure out a way to allow the vines to spill over, but still have that clean, manicured design.  So I had my landscaper use flagstone and sand (mixed with gravel):

 

He used this technique to frame my entire garden:

 

Now the vines can grow as crazy as they want and the yard can still be mowed.  And hopefully the vegetables and fruits themselves will grow healthier on the stone, rather than on the ground itself.

TO NOTE…be sure that if you have sprinkler heads, that you leave space for them to pop up still.

I am not going to challenge in reference to this post today.  Instead I will leave you with some additional ideas.