Inexpensive Planter

My preference is for a planter with a seat around it. The seat is a comfortable spot in the garden and you can sit while taking care of or harvesting from the garden. There are places where this will not work as well however, and a seat does take up a lot of room.

Here is how to make a fairly classic planter, that you can upgrade inexpensively with modern materials.

The wood in it is two cedar pickets more or less. These can be made from old fence sections or new wood. Since they are going to weather anyway, old fence will have a nice rustic look. In this case however the planks are new.

Here is the pattern I made. The sides are a a five degree tilt, I just wanted enough taper to be visible and no more.

One part of the section is longer than the other. The width at the very longest part in this case is 14 inches, but this can be varied.

Put together with a block of end scrap, you get this.

The sides are just like it only longer.

Short deck screws can easily put it together. The sides are a bit longer. This give a bit more meat to the end of the board, so the screws don’t split the wood as bad. I used a bit of scrap to space it evenly.

In an earlier day this would be made with two planks fitting into the bottom but not quiet at the bottom. To improve on this and make it a touch cheaper, I use a liner instead.

This is agricultural liner rated for 15 years. It should do a nice job of letting water drain and still keeping weeds from growing into the pot. This will still give me reasonable plant isolation and gives me more plant space. In addition the final result should be a bit more charming than all the black pots.

Bob