Huge shout out to my friend Mary that brought me the most aromatic Basil plant yesterday. I lent her some bins for moving and she brought them back yesterday and went above & beyond and ALSO brought me this plant!
After enjoying the wonderful smell of the basil and shoving it into the noses of all the kids I was teaching at Fashion Lab Afterschool yesterday, I got to work on making it a planting pot from an old Chock full’o Nuts coffee can I had here at the store.
Obviously, it’s pretty simple, but I thought it was such a good idea cause it turned out so well with such minimal effort, and it’s a great way to re-use and recycle.
Here is what I did:
1. Measure the height of the can as well as the diameter of the can.
2. Cut your piece of fabric (a kitchy vintage fabric is what I used here and thought it worked really well!) an inch taller than the can x 1.5 inches longer than the diameter.
3. Fold over the top and bottom of the piece of fabric 1/2″ and topstitch. This creates a nice finished edge on the top and bottom of the can.
4. Fold over one side edge of the fabric 1/2″ and topstitch. This is the side that is going to be visible on the can.
5. Make about 10 tiny holes (for drainage) in the bottom of the coffee can. I made mine by hammering a Phillips head screw driver into the bottom of the can with a rubber mallet. I thought this worked quite nicely.
6. Take the fabric and starting with the edge that is not topstitched, begin to glue the fabric piece to the coffee can lining up the topstitched top and bottom fabric edges with the top and bottom of the coffee can.
7. Keep hot glueing the fabric around the can until you come to where you started. The fabric should run out about 1 inch past the edge that you started at.
8. Pot your plant.
Any questions, let me know.