Rhubarb makes a nice accent.

Scroll through the attached link for some inspirational pictures including Architectural Collards! Other good ideas at that site.

After the initial harvest asparagus makes a nice ferny backdrop.

The other way to approach this is to think of ornamental plants that are also edible. Stuff like hyacinth bean, scarlet runner beans, maybe cardoon. i'm sure there are more.

Nice garden structures can also promote some veggies to front-yard status. Think peas or cucumbers on an obelisk or tuteur.

Post pictures later!

Here is a link that might be useful: Architectural Collards!

Peppers! I don't have enough beds or containers for all my pepper's. The
hot ones are especially pretty. I will be planting some hot ones along with
my flowers, in the planting area by my mailbox.

Hi, Staticx,
I obtain great visual and harvest results by loading my flower beds with sweet potatoes interspersed with tall pepper plants loaded with colorful fruits. I also mix in clumps of onions. Misterbaby.

My entire vegetable garden is in the front, because that's where the sun is, and like you, I have a large front and small backyard.

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It's only about 60 sq.ft., but in that space I cram peas, lettuce, carrots, radishes, basil, peppers, tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, and marigolds.

Because it is visible from the street, we chose to make it a curved bed to match the shape of the existing flower beds, instead of a traditional square of rectangular bed.

It does start to look like a bit of a jungle toward late summer, but by then I'm so busy harvesting veggies, and making salsa, pesto, pickles, etc. that I just ignore DH's complaints about it's appearance, LOL.

I really like the idea of the pepper plants and sweet potatoes mixed in the flower beds, too bad my perennial beds are already full!

Bonnie

I think the fern-like leaves of carrots would be pretty in a nice hedge type arrangement. I've grown tomatoes and peppers along with flowers and I think it looked good. Strawberries (though not veggies) make a nice ground cover. I think the trick is to not line them up in rows and to interplant vegetables with flowers. The vegetables act like structural elements and provide a nice backdrop.

My neighbor had a bed of strawberries and melons in the front of his house and it looked great. He interplanted with siberian iris and marigolds.

~Cindy

Personally, I think vege gardens are beautiful! Maybe not in November when the last of the tomatoes are looking ratty as heck, but most of the spring/summer they look great! I like to mix up some flowers around the raise beds.
I get raves about my vege garden and everyone loves to sit out there in the late afternoon with a glass of wine, wandering around. I also hide interesting little statues, gnomes and decorations in my plant for people to find!

First off, highalttransplant, that veggie garden is beautiful!! Do you find those tomato thingies work and are worth the money?

As for the original question, I think most any type of veggie can be ornamental. My thought is the key to "beauty" is the arrangement, which lots of variety in both height, shape and color, and not trying to do uniform type rows. I personally like the way kale and chard look when mature, and cucumber vines are very nice when trellised...same with beans!

Swiss chard is beautiful. There are many types of ornamental peppers: Fish Pepper has variegated green and white leaves and can be used like cayenne, most others (e.g. Bolivian Rainbow) are very hot and don't have the best flavor. There is a very pretty ornamental corn (Japanese Striped) with purple stripes up the stalks, but I don't think it produces ears.

Hurrah for front yard veggie gardening, I have this huge front yard full of grass and trees and I am going to transform it as tastefully as I can as not to upset the neighbors I have already put blackberrys with roses and a pomagranit tree after I ousted a really thorny bouganvilla(spelling?) that was sprawling everywhere, I plan to make a attractive raised bed 25ft by 3ft for asparagus and plant marigolds in front, I hope this will be pretty. Last summer we had an awful drought and my grass even so stayed green and pretty I felt everytime I watered that I was sinning and wasting, so less grass for me! I hope this trend catchs on and everyone does it.
Bonnie you did a great job at making the garden look beautiful. Happy gardening everyone :o)Deanna

Bitter melon plants.These plants have nice looking foliage and fragrant flowers.Flower fragrance has little wafty nature.Every one passing near by will notice it.

I think Zucchini looks good in the front yard...
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Thank you, Armymomma and Deanna! Uh ... no, the plastic spirals were pretty worthless actually, LOL. It was my first year to try them, but next year I'll just stick with the T-posts and the stretchy tie stuff.

I tried to plant runner beans on a trellis in the middle of the main perennial bed last year, thought it would be beautiful, but the grasshoppers kept eating them to the ground : (

I also stick basil plants in with the perennials. The purple ones are very ornamental.

One year, I put a teepee shaped trellis in the veggie bed and grew mini-pumpkins on it. They were cute, but the vines kept trying to take over the whole veggie bed.

I always seem to start more plants than I have space for, so who knows what may get stuck in the flower bed out of desparation, LOL.

Bonnie

wow,thanks for the input guys,i think im gonna do peppers and eggplants in the front as well as sweet potatoes. these will be mixed with flowers to diguise them. if any of the neigbors complain i'll give them the old one-two(one veggie for me two for them to keepum quiet).

Swiss Chard in its rainbow mix is a beauty (as mentioned), although frankly I think all my veggie plants are beautiful! But someone mentioned scarlet runner beans and I wanted to add that a trellis of purple podded beans is quite striking. And when you cook 'em they turn green and look like regular green beans, which is kind of cool.

Cheers!

Sunni

I second what Sunnibel said. Purple pole beans are wonderful and have great purple flowers. Emerite beans have lavender flowers, so the two growing together look charming. I had a lot of people ask me where I got the seeds last year, so they could try it (Scheepers).

Also, I've seen some great ideas in a few books for just this type of thing. One used metal arches with pole beans on one and cherry tomatoes on another. Fancy enough for the front yard, but still practical. Also, check out Sally Jean Cunningham's Great Garden Companions. She has some good designs for a front yard garden with veggies and flowers and also a small garden using arches and trellises.

If you grow some vegetables vertically, others on a nice looking trellis and add lots of flowers and herbs for interest and color, your garden will be very pretty and practical. It sounds like you're looking for something between a kitchen garden and a potager. You might check out some of the pictures on the potager forum for more ideas :)

As has been said and may I say that you can incorporate lots of vegetable into flower beds. peppers(mostly chilie types with small fruits of different color and shape, basils, sage, thyme, oregano.
Plant some lemon Grass. They look like ornamental grass but have fragrance and use.

I hear okra does well in the front yard. (google okra flowers). Additionally, spicy globe basil seems to be an attractive shrubby like plant.

such inspirational photos ~ ! from highalttransplant and noiwi!

really fun to mix em in and make it beautiful

Wow, you people are great!
But what about all these gases that come from the traffic?
Don't you think that they will accumulate in your veggies?

That's only a problem if you live on a street with a lot of traffic. If I had that problem, I would plant roses or shrubs along the street and have my veggies closer to the house. The roses or shrubs would give you a screen, to keep a bit of the noise and particulates from reaching the house. If you can't put them right up against the sidewalk, set them back a bit and it will nicely frame your garden.

If your front yard is a constant stream of semis belching diesel, I would move the garden to the back...or maybe just move, if possible.