home: made [ outdoor coffee table And stools ]

Summer is round the corner and as well as the stores being full of on trend, modern lounge and dining furniture for your garden, it’s also an opportunity to think about getting creative and making garden furniture from other paraphernalia. It’s great to seek out vintage, retro or industrial items that can be turned into tables, chairs, planters – all to give an unique quirky look to your outdoor living area.

We’ve found a few great ideas to give you some creative inspiration.

Quirky and bright, we love this easy diy, using old milk crates for stools or tables, spotted on BalconyGardenWeb. Head to eBay for old crates or contact local milk delivery firm. A great way to get pops of colour in the garden.

Search for vintage style giant spools, which sound crazy but are relatively easy to get from builders merchants or diy stores as this is what they sell electric cabling, chains and rope on. If they sell by the length then every so often they’ll be getting rid of the spool! We also spotted some on eBay where someone has already sanded, prepared and made perfect to use! A sourced spool, with a little sanding and a wax or varnish, make perfect ready made tables! The wood is generally already weather proof.

With a bit of a search, we spotted an abundance of ideas for the wooden reels including a gorgeous planter on The Empowered Educator Online.

Another great project would be to upcycle large old tins (often from cooking oil or other ingredients) into stools or tables. Add wooden tops or padded tops. Spray in chosen colour or leave as is and take advantage of the cool typography and graphics often used as the labelling of the product.

There’s lots of inspiration on Pinterest including these padded top stools from The Upcyclist blog