Spring has sprung \0/! In some places in name only, Cape Town we are looking at you! But here in Snor City it has been springy since mid-August. There are some shitty aspects to Pretoria but the weather is definitely not one of them! So to celebrate spring and fill up some dead space in the courtyard I decided to try my hand at making my own wall planters.
I used Ronny K’s instructable as a guideline. Initially I was going to use it as is, but I was not happy with the amount of space inside the pocket and fiddled a little with the pattern. This is what I came up with in the end. It turns out I am not that good at drawing stuff with Paint, so I hope my photos will explain better than my attempt at drawing.
First cut your material. I used an A3 paper to make my template so I just stuck with that size. A3 paper is roughly 30 cm by 42 cm big, so I made my rectangle 32 cm by 44 cm. If you have a plain sewing machine, zigzag all the edges to keep it from unraveling and create a 0.5 cm hem on all the edges. After this little exercise I finally understand the appeal of an overlocker sewing machine.
You now have a neatly edged rectangle and can get cracking with the folding and cutting. At this point you should go get the iron too, I found that if I iron in the folds the eventual sewing is much easier.
- Fold your rectangle in half and iron in the fold. Then make a second fold a couple of centimeters below the halfway point and iron that one in as well.
When you unfold the material it should look like this.
- Next, fold over the edges lengthwise and pin the longer side up to the halfway fold.
- Make a cut on the second fold that is as wide as the folded over hem.
- After the cuts you should have a T-shape.
- Now we need to pin the shorter side in order to create a deeper planting pocket.
- When both sides are pinned it should fit neatly in between the hems on the longer side.
- Pin the hems over the pocket’s seams and cut corners at the bottom of the pocket.
- Your final pin-up should look like this.
- Unfold the overlapping flaps and sew the pocket onto the back panel.
- This seam is hidden so it doesn’t matter if it is ugly. Just make it strong!
- Fold the hem back over and sew along the edge as well as next to the pocket folds. Thus the pocket is now held to the back panel by three seams – I figure that should be strong enough.
- And finally, fill your pocket with potting soil. I tipped out some of the soil that was in the bag in this picture, the amount of soil really depends on what you plant in your pockets.
Add your plants to your pocket – and there you have it! One wall hanging pocket planter to brighten up a dull wall or for creating a vertical garden in a small space. I still need to source grommets to make the holes for hanging. I am thinking I will win at a curtain making place or a hardware store but as soon as I have found it I will update and let you know where and how.
Until next time,
V
PS) I have been toying with the idea of making this a no-sew project, using glue instead of stitches. Will Sew Simple work? I am scared the bond will not be strong enough. Any glue suggestions?