Repurposed BBQ Planter

I found a great blog this week. It's called Renewables At Home and focuses on ways to "reduce the impact your lifestyle has on the environment." One article that caught my eye was Two More R's: Refuse and Repurpose. It talks about the importance of finding new purposes for items that are broken or worn out. I did just that with an old BBQ at the cabin.

I've been wanting a potting stand and planter to put under my kitchen window. I designed one to build from wood, but when our BBQ was damaged during a winter wind storm (see Flipping Burgers), it gave me a new idea. Rather than throw it away, I decided to clean it up to be my "new" planter.

To make it a look less like a BBQ, I removed the side shelf, burner, knobs and lid. The legs and sides were in pretty good shape, but the bottom self was very rusty. I used some leftover RustOleum paint we had to cover up the labels on the front panel and resurface the self.









The back panel proclaiming "Master Chef" became "Master Gardener" with a garden bunny mascot. I wanted plastic trays to fit on the shelf and inside the top to hold my seedlings and plants. I found litter boxes on sale at Canadian Tire for $4 on sale that were the perfect size. That made the total cost of my planter remodel $8.

The planter looks pretty good. Yes, I know, it still looks a bit like a BBQ, but it makes me feel good to know I gave a new purpose to something that would have otherwise taken up space for years to come in the dump.

Have you repurposed anything lately? I'd love to hear what you've done. -- Margy