The Miller Family's Organic Garden : The Ultimate Outdoor Living Amenity

The Miller family’s new custom home sits like a white citadel, proudly nestled into a wooded hillside in Southeast Charlotte. The family enjoys being outdoors, and with the help of their architect and builder, realized their vision of the perfect outdoor living space. Amenities like a saltwater swimming pool and an outdoor kitchen with refrigerated wine coolers, and an imported Italian pizza oven were thoughtfully placed for convenience and utility. And since growing organic produce was right up there with poolside pizza, their landscape architect cleverly placed three raised beds just outside the home’s backdoor, and adjacent to the outdoor kitchen.

The Miller family’s garden design includes three specially made Kitchen Garden raised beds, that feature supporting stakes placed on the outside of the cedar boards, for a unique look. The south facing garden site sits just outside the kitchen and breakfast area, so the family can harvest salad greens minutes before they're served with an evening meal. 

The garden receives more direct sunlight than a Las Vegas parking lot, and so we fitted each raised bed with 1/2” drip irrigation to make it easy to water the garden, and make adjustments to the watering schedule based on the season. The drip system was placed on its own irrigation zone, so that watering can be controlled independently of shrubs, grass, and other landscape plants on the property.

Our team filled each bed with a loamy blend of pine fines, mushroom compost and Stalite PermaTill, which will help ensure good drainage and soil structure season after season. Once the soil was carefully amended and watered, we planted a colorful assortment of cool season leafy greens including several varieties of kale, mustard greens,and swiss chard. Broccoli and cauliflower rounded out the rest of their fall garden, and we even saved room for three small rows of Inchelium Red garlic, which should go nicely on some of those poolside pizzas next summer. Happy gardening, Miller family!