In Today's guide I will show you how I transformed a basic nursery pot into a vintage stone planter made out of one main ingredient...grout!!😃

Let's keep it real, If your hobby is collecting (hoarding) plants, then I can almost   guarantee you have a stack or two😜 of good ol' nursery pots. Mm-hmn I understand🙋🏻 no need to be embarrassed my gardner friend, I too collect them for "future plants". But what if I told you that you can easily repurpose those dirty pots into a completely new planter using simple grout and a little bit of paint?!

This garden project was extremely satisfying for me since I had the chance to mix and play with paint👩🏻‍🎨 and also because I made something old to new again. The "cobblestone" look was created accidentally but I'd like to think that I pulled it off by simply going with the flow and letting this project run it's course.🤔

Let's get started!

Materials:

1. Nursery pot

2. Grout

3. Knife or small trowel

4. Primer

5. Gloves

6. Paint brush (small)

7. Paint (your choice of color)

8. Sandpaper

9. Sponge

10. Butcher Paper (to protect your surface area)

11. Pinecone (to add texture)

12. Seashell (optional)

13. Cup 

Procedure:

Step #1: Primer

The first thing I did was tape paper down on my workstation. I washed my nursery pot and, once dried, I balanced my nursery pot on top of my red cup. This will elevate my nursery pot and help the primer drain off of the pot properly. If you don't want primer to get inside the pot, cover the holes with pieces of paper towels. I then put my gloves on and grabbed my can of primer and sprayed the entire outside surface of my pot. I waited an hour to let my pot completely dry.  

 Step 2: Grout

Once my pot was completely dry, I put my gloves back on and opened my container of grout. I used a plastic knife to spread the grout on the pot, it worked quite well. The grout was a bit more runny than I expected it to be, but it was thick enough to not completely slide off the pot. It was like icing a cake, I had fun doing this part, I made sure to cover the entire surface of the pot including the top and the bottom. I waited about 2 hours for the grout to settle but not completely dry.

 Step 3: Texture

I knew I wanted my pot to have texture but I didn't necessarily know how to create it. I thought of stamping a design but didn't find any I liked. So I went for something natural and simple. Pinecones have a beautiful texture to them so I simply pressed the surface of a pinecone to the semi-dry grout. I wiped the excess grout off of the pinecone with a wet paper towel to keep the design consistent and clean throughout the pot. I added a seashell to the front side of my pot, to give it a beachy vibe and, in my opinion, it gives it a unique touch.🐚🌿

I then waited for the grout to completely dry, this took at least three hours. 

Step 4: Paint

Once the grout dried and became hard, I prepped my paint for the surface of the pot. I decided on the color grey. I mixed black and white and used a sponge to apply the paint. I lightly pressed the paint to the surface of the pot and left white spots here and there. This happened naturally since the pinecone created a "bumpy" texture on the grout. 

I let the paint dry, which didn't take much time, about 30 minutes. I then quickly realized that this planter could be considered done but since I'm not very easily satisfied with my projects I went ahead and filled in the white areas with green paint. The plan was to give it an "aged" look but maybe not. This will take a little more experience with mixing and applying paint (but I will get there)😉 .

Step 5: Sandpaper

Because I didn't like how bold the green color looked on the pot I decided to sand the grout down. This gave it that weathered look I was looking for. I was finally happy with the finished product. I used a pretty rough sandpaper, so it took a little more elbow grease to break the grout down. Once sanded down, I wiped the dust with a small brush. 

Step 6: Planting

Now that my planter was finally finished it was time to use it. I had the perfect plant for it, a Selaginella Kraussiana. A vibrant green plant with feather like foliage. 

I filled my planter with soil and made a well in the middle.

I removed the nursery pot from around my plant and placed the root ball straight into the well of soil. 

I pressed down on the root ball, placed more soil on top to anchor the plant down, and cleaned the soil off with my small brush. 

My once almost forgotten nursery pot is now a unique hand-made planter exactly to my liking. That is the beauty of this project. You can create any type of planter you want. You can add any kind of texture you want, paint it any color you want and the finished piece is something you made that came from your imagination. You can also make this and give it as a gift for the plant lover in your life who will greatly appreciate it. It takes a little creativity and time but this project takes very few materials and is useful, especially if you collect plants.  

Thank you for reading my blog and I hope you too give a little TLC to your forgotten nursery pots. 

Blog and photography by Mel Zuniga