Make Unique Planters With Concrete

To fill a need and be creative at the same time, I decided to make my own planters and garden pieces from concrete mix that is very reasonable in cost, and is not that difficult to work with. I show several different planters-fountain-and simple forms to use in the garden as you see fit. 

Step 1 Gather Materials

For this project, I needed to make forms to pour my concrete mix into. So I needed: wood material for forms, concrete mix and tools to work it with, some styrofoam, some clear tubing used for drains, and inlet tubes for the fountain, a wheelbarrow to mix the concrete in and some water.

Comments

[mokee]

I have made planters using paper crete. You just mix in shredded newspaper with the concrete. It makes them not so heavy.

[skiedra]

Creativeman, where did you get the man & lizard images from?

I was working on another instructable and it's difficult to find a 2D image/cartoon that would look good when cut out.

[Creativeman]

There is a plethora of images on the net (check clip art)....I think I drew the lizard, and you can either draw them from the screen images, or, cut and paste most of them....alot are copyrighted, but I don't sell these, so there is no issue I believe. Good luck, let me know how you do!

[Ginger Magnus]

What a great idea! These are going on my list for sure!

I have been working on a concrete bar top and Im going to grind and polish it for a terrazzo look, the same procedure will work for these planters to give them another look.

[Creativeman]

Thanks, GM...I hope you will post pictures of the polished look. That sounds like a great treatment. Any chance of seeing an instructable? You could polish my planters anytime!

[Ginger Magnus]

You will have to bring them to West Texas, and provide the H20. Water is becoming a scarce commodity in the Permian Basin.

[jfrancis-2]

that is an awesome idea.. i really wanna try this

[lyonpridej]

I LOVE these! My mom lives in the high-desert of AZ & has lots of real lizards(which she loves). I've been thinking of making her some concrete planters & these would be perfect with the lizards! Thanks! BTW-I have never tried it, but I've heard that instead of 'tapping' or 'jiggling' to settle the concrete, you can just hold a hand sander on the form & it will vibrate the bubbles to the surface.

[Creativeman]

Thanks for your comments

[pfred2]

Do you oil your form before you pour it? Have you thought about making your designs out of silicone so you can reuse them? I think you need to do some more tapping to reduce the parging you're getting, unless you like it. Real nice though I like it.

[Creativeman]

Thanks...I do use oil, but may not have on these...not critical for this app. You're right about the tapping, but there is a limit, so it's difficult to decide exactly which point you stop. The silicone does look interesting, but for my purposes, not sure it would be worht the additional cost...I only need to make a few items for my garden, so it's no big issue just to cut the designs out of foam. it certainly is cost effective.

[skiedra]

Creativeman, you are my new Instructables hero :D

Seriously, infinite simplicity leading to really awesome stuff. True Zen.

[Creativeman]

Thanks for your comment.

[Ninzerbean]

Are these about shoe-box size? Larger? They look really great. I used to make concrete things and started adding all sorts of peat, dirt, perlite etc. to make them lighter in weight. They were still really heavy though. Well done!

[Creativeman]

Thanks, Ninzerbean...you are very astute! Check out the picture. I've seen that, hypertufa, isn't it? Just never got too enthused about that art, although it does look cool.