Having seen a lot of guides on turning wine bottles into interesting things, I decided to do something of my own. With a leftover plank (from a bedside table disassembly) and plenty of wine bottles (never in short supply), I set on to build an indoor hanging planter for a money plant. This was a simple half a day project that you can do on a lazy Sunday.

Step 1: What You Need

This is a simple project with simple requirements.

Wine bottle
Wooden plank to act as the base plate

The size of the wine bottle does not matter. However, the way I have built the project puts one constraint which is that the wine bottle's height should be less than the height of the wooden plank

1 x hard aluminium strip (hard enough to hold shape, soft enough to be bent around)

I used this because I could not come up with a clamp mechanism to hold the bottle in place. If you have access to one, ignore this one.

1 x L shaped bracket
4 x small screws (their length must be less than the thickness of the wooden plank)
2 x small nut+bolt sets
1 x bracket to support nail in the back
Spray paint

Step 2: Prepare the Clamp

This is really the hardest part of the job and it isn't that hard. Mark the center point of the aluminium strip. Then start rounding the strip around the neck of the wine bottle to create a nice snug fit. Flatten the next inch or so of the strip to create a gap from the plank. Finally, flatten out the last bits to accept the screw on top of the plank. See images for more details.

Now create 4 holes for screws. 2 on the ends of the strip to be screwed into the plank. These holes should be larger to accept larger sized screws as they will be carrying the weight. The other 2 holes should be in the flat portion between the plank and the bottle. We will be putting nuts and bolts here to ensure the strip remains tight and snug.

Step 3: Prepare the Plank

While the clamp should be enough to keep the bottle in place, it is good to take some precaution in case it decided to slip. I put an L bracket at the bottom of the plank to support the bottle. The placement is straightforward and kept in place with 2 screws.

Place the bottle on the plank now to ensure everything is lining up.

Lets turn over to the back of the plank now. Screw in the clamp to hold the nail. This is the sort of thing you will find in almost all hanging photo frames. Feel free to use one from an old frame. Where you put this is up to you. I chose to put this bang in the middle to ensure the weight of the whole set up is more equally distributed.

Step 4: Paint Time!

This is always my favourite part. I chose an off-white base colour. This eventually turned out to be the wrong choice for us since that is also the colour of the wall on which it is supposed to go. Ensure the plank gets enough time to dry out.

Step 5: Final Assembly

Hold the bottle in place with the bottom resting on the L bracket. Use the drill with the correct bit to screw in the main clamp. Go easy on this and keep ensuring everything is straight.

And there you are! Your hanging wine bottle planter is ready. I don't have a plant with me yet. Will get that tomorrow and update this.

PS. Eventually hung it just above my previous project - the homemade floor lamp.

Update:

The earlier paint scheme was not doing much for the thing. Wife chose brilliant orange as the new background and have to say, what a wonderful choice. The whole thing now just pops.

I finally put in the money plant as well. Found a healthy one with a strong well developed root system.

Looks pretty cool, wouldn't you say?

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For more from our world of wood and food, head over to The Yellow Squash. Bunch of home improvement, upcycling and healthy food related projects coming there.