Just to note in passing :-)

Our back garden is due to transition from grass to hard landscaping
sometime in the next 12 months or so.

Therefore no incentive to prepare borders for flowers and vegetables.

I've had my eye on some 'raised bed' plastic bags sold in various places,
and saw some - roughly 1m by 1m - for sale 2 for £5 in a local shop.

Well, for £10 I would get four raised beds which would do this year and
then could be taken down in the winter or whenever we start the
transformation.

All I needed to do was fill them up, and start planting.

So, I soon established that each bed would take the following:

1 * 120 litre bag of Homebase compost
1 bag Homebase farmyard manure
[Mix in some chicken manure and Growmore into the bottom two layers]
1/2 Homebase 120 litre bag of compost
1 bag Homebase top soil to cap it off.

Oh, and the sides are too floppy to hold everything in easily.
So, with one side up against the fence panels, and all four bags in one
long row, I now have the ends and outer side supported by old floor boards
held in place by cut up garden canes hammered into the ground.

This does give somewhere to tie the green plastic garden twine to keep
beasties (including our cats) off the freshly turned earth.

The result does look promising.

I have six outdoor tomatoes, four outdoor cucumbers, and a dozen Cos
lettuce all bought from garden centres/nurseries to get things started.

I intend to sow seeds of lettuce, onions etc. in plastic tubs and plant
out anything that germinates - a better prospect than planting seed
directly, I think.

However, all this cost quite a bit more than £10!

Cheers

Dave R