Decorative potager

The distinction between a 'potager' and a 'bog-standard' vegetable plot is the degree of decorative value, largely derived from formal elements (regular beds, trained fruit forms) combined with flowers and the most decorative vegetables.

I had this very much in mind when I turned my front garden largely over to vegetables and a variety of trained and half-standard pears. The locals hereabouts aren't the most enlightened, and anything that strays from the norm of bedding plants edging a lawn, tortured to within an inch of it's life, (or worse, just grim concrete) is viewed with great suspicion as a sign of terminal eccentricity. Despite the risks of being tarred and feathered, my front is very productive, with 18 different pear/quince cultivars (growing in a number of trained forms, mostly step-overs, but also arches, espaliers and 2 half standards). One bed is entirely devoted to strawberries, which have yielded about 8lbs of fruit already in this, their first proper year of fruiting, and still have a way to go before they finish. The other bed will eventually be devoted to asparagus, which I'm gradually building up from seed. I planted the part where the latter had failed with garlic last year, and have just harvested a bumper crop of 40 very large bulbs.

For some reason the colour scheme ended up being red, with a stunning display of shrub rose Scarlet Fire, Papaver orientalis 'Turkenlouis', red valerian with contrast provided by dark red foliage of various sedums, bronze fennel and Lysimachia ciliata 'Firecracker'.