DIY Paver Planter

Ready to make your own planter for the patio? I’m sharing the full step by step tutorial for my DIY Paver Planter. 

I’m in full “spruce up the yard and back patio” mode. No joke. Other than putting out a few pots and flowers every year, our back patio doesn’t get much attention. Since we built the house, I’ve been saying I’m going to give it a little TLC. I just know it would be a place we’d love to hang out and relax, but that would mean we’d need more than a few random pieces of furniture!

So, I’ve devised a plan to get our back patio into shape. And one of the first things I wanted to get done in time for planting flowers, is our DIY Paver Planter….

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

I am giddy with excitement! It turned out so amazing, and we plan to make two more to finish off the back of our house.

Here’s how we made it, (PLEASE NOTE: it’s not hard, but there are a lot of steps and dry time!) 

DIY Paver Planter

Affiliate links are provided below. Full disclosure here

Supplies:

Step One: Layout Your Pavers

We started by buying these 10.5″ x 7″ pavers…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We laid them out to start building the frame…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Two: Build The Frame

We used 2″ x 4″ x 8′ redwood boards, which we later cut in half to resemble a 2″ x 2″ board.

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

I cut each 2″ x 4″ board into 21″ lengths…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then, we ran them through the table saw to cut them in half…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

From there, we laid the wood around the pavers., and because the boards were 21″ long, we ended up with 4″ long legs. Perfect!

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Three: Stain & Protect The Wood Frame

Once all of the pieces for the frame were cut, I stained them with Provincial by Minwax, let it dry, then added two coats of the Helmsman Spar Urethane.

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Even though we used redwood, I wanted to make sure it would hold up over time…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Four: Assemble The Frame

Once the legs dried, we started building the frame. To eliminate the wood splitting, we pre-drilled our holes…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then laid out the frame…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And screwed both sides of the frame to the bottom board…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Five: Add Stone Pavers

With that attached, we used this stone glue…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We added it to the side and bottom of the boards..

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then started adding in the pavers one at a time…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We added the glue to each side of the pavers, making sure they stuck together…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And then added the second paver…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We repeated the process with the other two pavers, and once we were done, we had this…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We ran a bead of the glue on the top pavers…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then added the top board, clamped it all together, and screwed the top to the sides…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Six: Build Second Side & Let The Pavers Dry

We left that side to dry and built the second side of the planter the exact same way. Once it was finished, we left both sides to dry overnight (at least 24 hours).

Step Seven: Build The Third Side

The next night, we started making the third side. We pre-drilled our holes on the first set of sides we had left to dry…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then stood it up to start adding the other side…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We added the bottom board, and screwed it in place…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then applied glue to all edges of the frame…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And added the pavers, one by one…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Eight: Attach The Sides

Then, we added the second full side and top, and clamped it together, then added our screws…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Nine: Build The Fourth Side

We left it to sit and dry another full 24 hours. When we came back the next day, we added the fourth and final side…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We started by carefully flipping it over- this is where we were very happy we glued, and glued, and glued some more to all those pavers…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then, we started gluing and adding the pavers, as well as the top and bottom boards…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Step Ten: Add The Bottom Boards

With the final side built, we added the boards to the bottom. We just evenly spaced them, then screwed them on…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

We also made sure to add plenty of glue to those bottom boards as well…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And just like that, we had our planter! We left it to dry another 24 hours, then moved it to our patio the next day. Let me just tell you, this baby is heavy. Like, wow! It works out perfectly since the wind strikes in full force… This isn’t moving.

Step Eleven: Add Landscape Fabric

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

To line the planter, I used landscape fabric. I rolled it inside the box…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

…Stapling the top along the bottom of wood frame…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Then I added another layer of the fabric going in the opposite direction…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

After it was stapled in place, I trimmed off any long pieces of the fabric, then folded it over the staple…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

That gave me a nice clean line, and then I added a second row of staples to hold it all together.

Step Twelve: Add Fabric & Plants

Now it was ready for potting soil and flowers!

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

Let me just tell you, after I got those plants in there, I was completely in love…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

It’s just lovely!

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And I can’t wait until the plants are big enough and spilling over the sides. It’s going to be absolutely gorgeous!

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

In the mean time, I just stuck some of my strawberries and perennials to show you how the box looks. Poor things wouldn’t last long if I left them out over night…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And now you can completely understand why I must have two more. They are going to frame our doors…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And as for that combination of stone and warm wood, well it’s just perfect together…

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

And boy oh boy was I ready to start planting the rest of my flowers. This was a great warm up run, but I need to patiently wait for the weather to warm up a bit at night. I know I can’t be the only one who’s trying to wait ever so patiently. 😀

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

I am so happy to have this lovely DIY paver planter on our back patio. It’s absolutely motivating me to keep making progress. With enough DIY projects, we will have the patio space I’ve always hoped for. 😀

How to make a paver planter. Full tutorial by The Wood Grain Cottage

AND- I’m so excited to share about The Home Depot’s Do- It- Herself in-store workshops. They are held monthly at all The Home Depot store locations on the third Thursday of each month. Grab your girlfriends and have a fun filled ladies night learning new skills, knowledge and confidence from the pros! You can be a great DIY’er, promise! They’ll help you gain hands- on experience, step- by- step instruction and so much more! If you have any project plans, this is your time to shine!

Want to learn more? Register online today to attend this month’s workshop!

hd_logo_bloggerThis post is sponsored by The Home Depot.

Disclosure: Compensation was provided by The Home Depot via Mode Media.  The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of The Home Depot.

 

21 Comments

  1. This is an awesome project. What patients you have waiting for each side to dry. It was well worth it, because your end result was great. I believe you are right, this little gem isn’t going anywhere in the wind.

  2. I love how you used the smaller pavers together – this is awesome! Here’s the version I did. I made mine a little stubbier:
    modpodgerocksblog.com/2015/04/how-to-build-a-paver-planter.html

  3. Awesome!! How is the drainage with this? Did you have to poke any holes in the landscape fabric, or was the fabric porous enough?

    1. Thank you! The planter always drains really well, but it will depend on how thick the landscape fabric is that you use. If you don’t notice it draining, you’ll want to poke some holes in the fabric. I hope that helps! 🙂

  4. I lovs this rustic looking planter, wonderful instructions. Im making one, or a couple for veggie boxes since I can no longer bend over and garden the traditional way, in the ground.

  5. Thanku Shayna for a great tutorial, all the photos are a godsend. Im so tired of looking for something to repot 2 big Pony Tails into, getting to the point were I was going to spend up to $100 on one pot to hold one, they’re pretty big!
    I’ve seen heaps with the floor tiles which are cool too but im not sure about putting such big plants into them, id much prefer the solid concrete pavers idea.
    Thanks again, much appreciated 😃

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