How to Build a Keyhole Garden Bed

Keyhole garden beds are circular raised beds with a break on one side that allows access into the center of the bed. Cut like a keyhole, the break in the circle creates a small walkway that both looks attractive and serves a utilitarian purpose. If you prefer to make a keyhole bed on flat ground, fill the keyhole area with paver stones, bark, gravel or other material to differentiate it from the planting area on its three sides.

Measuring tape
White flour
Cardboard
Shovel
Compost
Organic materials
Rocks or bricks
Paving material

Instructions

- 1
  Measure the area where you plan to build your keyhole garden. Keyhole beds can vary in size, but it’s wise to make the distance from the center of the keyhole to the center of the surrounding bed no longer than you can comfortably reach into.
- 2
  Mark the edges of your circular bed by sprinkling white flour on the ground. If it’s not a perfect circle, that’s fine. Also mark the area where your keyhole will be situated: make it wide enough to walk through and extend it approximately halfway through the circle.
- 3
  Lay flattened cardboard on the ground, following your flour border marking. It will kill any lawn or weeds underneath it. Then spread 2- to 3-inch layers of organic compost, wood ash, topsoil, peat moss, grass clippings, chopped up plant parts and other organic materials until the bed is the height you desire.
- 4
  Build a border for the bed with bricks, rocks, cinder blocks or wooden planks if you wish.
- 5
  Lay paver stones, bark, bricks, gravel or other material on the ground in your keyhole area. Choose a material that will make walking into the keyhole comfortable.
- 6
  Plant vegetables, flowers, herbs or any other type of relatively small plants in the soil mixture that surrounds the keyhole.

How to Landscape Borders Around Houses

Terraced Landscape Ideas

Flower Beds & Specialty Gardens