Last year we began gardening and it was such a fun experience for our family! We built 4’x8’ garden beds and our vegetables thrived! However, we were not so lucky with everything else we planted in the soil outside of the beds, so this year we decided to build two more. We love how the garden beds keep many of the weeds out, deter our pets, look appealing and are much easier on our backs while working.
Garden beds can be very versatile to suit your needs but Here’s How we created our 4’x8’ garden boxes! All of the products used for this project can be found at your local Home Hardware store.
Materials needed per box:
9 – 2”x8”x8’ Brown treated ACQ
1 – 4”x4”x8’ Brown treated ACQ post
8 – Cedar fence post holder
3″ Screws
Using a chop saw cut three – 2”x8”x8’s in half to 4’. These will be your end pieces.
Begin building the bottom level of the garden box by positioning two 2”x8”x8’s and two 2”x8”x4’s.
Before attaching the first corner ensure any crowning in the wood is facing up and that the corner of the 2”x8”x8’ and 2”x8”x4’ are flush on the top where they intersect.
Using a drill put four 3” screws on each corner. Repeat for all four corners.
Note: The butt end of the 2″x8” that got overlapped now does the overlapping on the next corner.
Repeat these steps for the second and third level however offset the corners overlapping from the first level.
If you find your levels are shifting while building you can temporarily screw them together.
Using a chop saw cut your posts to the same height as your garden box. For this build we are using 3 levels which is approximately 2’. You will notice we cut our posts at about 30” long and this was only because we are accommodating the soil we will be backfilling to make our garden boxes level with our existing ones.
Mark where the corner posts will sit and using a sledgehammer pound the fence post holder into the ground (we used a cut-off from a post between the post holder and sledgehammer). These post holders are great if you need some extra stability in the ground. They were easy to pound in and reassures us that these boxes won’t move given the marshy area we live in! You may also choose to use longer posts rather than post holders, or none at all.
Place the 4″x4″ posts into the fence post holders and check to make sure they are level with each other. Using a drill and 3″ screws secure the posts to the garden bed. We used 9 screws on each corner (3 screws per 2”x8” section). Lastly, tighten the bolts on the fence post holder.
Lattice worked wonderfully last year for our peas and beans so we added another 4’x8′ cedar classic ultra light vinyl to one of the boxes.
To do this we simply created a frame for the lattice and attached it to our garden box using 3″ screws. First, we cut two 2″x4″x8’s into four 41″ pieces using a chop saw which became our vertical pieces. We chose to have the lattice partially embedded in the soil but you can alter the frame height to be the same size as the lattice. To do this the vertical pieces would then be cut to 45″.
Two 2″x4″x8’s became the horizontal top and bottom pieces of the frame. The vertical supports are spaced 32″ apart.
Once the frame was assembled and attached to the garden box we added the lattice using 1 1/2″ screws.
And thats how we created our raised garden beds. With the warm weather finally here, we can’t wait to get outside and start gardening!
The friendly folks over at our local Home Hardware were amazing when it came to helping us select the best materials and design plan for these garden beds. They can help you with all of your Lawn & Garden goals!
