One day I came across a beautiful vintage look birdcage that was a bit worse for wear and so had been cast onto the corner for garbage pick up. I loved the style of it and thought it would be a terrible waste to send it to the dump so I grabbed it and took it home. I have always loved the idea of upcycling and I decided I was going to figure out a way to make this into a beautiful planter.
Here is what I was starting with. Meanwhile check out the little photobomber I just discovered haha.
I have no idea what this horrid, tacky, stubborn, pink, sticky crap was, but it was everywhere and a pain in the butt to remove!!! I resorted to an old toothbrush, boiling water and detergent, followed up with some alcohol wipes.
Evil pink stuff
So once it was all clean and pretty it was time to decide what I was going to do with it. I had a vision of creating a succulent planter. The idea being that in time the succulents will grow and poke out through/overhang the bars. So I went shopping…
My haul 🙂
Then it was time to find out if what was in my head would translate well to real life [I should note that I know others have done this successfully, but I was doing it without any instructions from any of those people 🙂 ]. I lined the base with Coconut fibre to stop the soil from falling straight through the bottom of the cage.
Make sure you compress it well. I tried to make mine a bit like a nest with the edges raised.
Then I added in the succulent planting mix and my succulents. Here are some photos of the finished product 🙂
I chose succulents that would spread, grow and hang out between the bars nicely as well as flower in different colours.
I am very proud of my first upcycle attempt. Especially considering there were no instructions… I am happy to report that there were no pieces leftover post construction 🙂
October 27th, 2014 at 10:23 pm
Very nice! I bet that as the plants grow it will look even prettier. I am always looking at this or that thinking it could be made into something nice. 🙂 sometimes I do it and sometimes I don’t.
October 27th, 2014 at 10:42 pm
Thank you! That is the idea, I didn’t want to over plant it at the start because I know how much they would grow. I would love to do a herb version of this so you could have hanging herbs 🙂
October 29th, 2014 at 4:22 am
Can you just make this for me and bring it to my house? It’s so pretty. I am not even a little bit crafty, but I’m siting next to a bag of tulle and ribbon so that I can make my daughter’s Halloween tutu. *sighs*
October 29th, 2014 at 1:55 pm
Hahaha you live pretty far away hun… that would be some quest lol.
This was my first attempt and I am stoked with it, I am going to wait to make sure the plants don’t die off and if all goes well I think I shall make more.
The tutu should be relatively fine once you get started. Check out this wikihow, it has the best knot suggestion I have found http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Non-Sew-Tutu hope this helps. I am with you helping in spirit 😀
October 29th, 2014 at 2:56 pm
I made it so quickly. I kind of want to make another one for me. I might. Is this how it starts?
October 29th, 2014 at 3:51 pm
That is exactly how it starts! I think you should do a blue one, if you pair it with a red tank shirt with a gold winged “W” on it you are WonderWoman 🙂
If you really want to get accurate you could paste somr white stars on the tutu 😀 I reckon you would rock that outfit so well 🙂
November 2nd, 2014 at 2:05 pm
Very Cool!!
November 10th, 2014 at 2:47 pm
Thanks 🙂 It was nice to try something different.
December 1st, 2014 at 12:31 pm
It looks great! I love me some succulents. Are you going to hang it?
December 1st, 2014 at 2:11 pm
I actually made it for some friends of mine, but they haven’t come over yet so I haven’t had the chance to find out about it. It is currently hanging under my eaves next to a goldfish bush 🙂