Where do I start? Edibles with ornamentals

For beginner gardeners, getting to grips with the fundamentals can seem daunting. But in this 12-part exclusive series, Alan Titchmarsh is sharing his wisdom to help you master the skills that really matter. This month, get the best of both worlds by growing edible and ornamental plants together. Discover why you don't always need to grow beautiful blooms and delicious harvests of fruit and veg separately with Alan's advice.

- Alan Titchmarsh

You'll learn about:

✓ Growing veg and ornamentals as companion plants

✓ Making use of every space

✓ Using containers to grow

Perfect partners

In gardening, there is an understandable misconception that flowers belong in borders and fruit and vegetables have plots of their own. All of which is fine and dandy if you have space to separate the different types of plant, but growing edibles and flowers together has been practised for centuries; what's more, it's mutually beneficial. Flowers attract pollinators to peas and beans, apples and pears, which need the intervention of insects to yield well, and by not having a concentration of any one crop in any one space, pest and disease infestations are often avoided. Give the mixture an artful design and you have a patch of earth that is both beautiful and useful.

Pretty and productive

A mix of edibles and ornamentals can be achieved on any scale you like - from the massive parterres of Villandry in France, to a tiny potager on a pocket-hanky patch, or simply a stretch of bed or border where flowers, trained fruit trees and vegetables can all play their part in a garden that looks good, tastes good and... well, does you good just be in it.

Where space is in short supply the same effect can be achieved in pots and containers, arranged to provide a succession of blooms and fruit and veg that will look attractive and offer sustenance from spring to autumn.

There's nothing new here. In the Middle Ages, monastery gardens would be a patchwork quilt of medicinal and culinary herbs, flowers for fragrance and beauty, and produce for the refectory.

Cottage gardeners from the 17th century onwards would pack their tiny plots with fruit, veg, herbs and flowers for the house.