Ryde, NSW

Another installation for the Edible Gardens in Schools project, which has been a very successful initiative of Ryde Council and a program we've been proud to support right across the area. North Ryde Public School asked for two self-watering wicking beds to kick off a growing and social area in an unused part of their grounds — exactly the kind of neglected corner that turns into a productive outdoor classroom once there's something growing in it.

Like all our beds, these two raised garden beds are built from kiln-dried, vegetable-grade timber with our food-safe iron-oxide finish — no cheap CCA pine near where students grow their food — fully lined over a sealed wicking reservoir and filled with our custom-blended organic growing medium, so they crop well from the first planting. The reservoir does the watering: each bed stores water in its base and the plants draw it up from below, so the garden keeps growing right through the weekends and school holidays with very little staff time.

For North Ryde Public School that means a low-maintenance teaching garden and social space where students can plant, tend and harvest across the year. The leafy North Shore, with its big trees, shade and clay soil, can be a hard place to grow vegetables in the ground, which is another reason a raised wicking bed works so well here.

UrbanVeg builds self-watering raised garden beds and vegetable beds for schools across Ryde, the North Shore and greater Sydney — if your school would like a productive teaching garden, we'd love to help you plan it.