Why Household Objects Make Brilliant Plant Pots

There is something quietly satisfying about a chipped mug doing a second job on the windowsill, or a stack of old crates turning into a productive herb patch on a cramped balcony. For anyone gardening in a flat, a courtyard or a narrow back yard, repurposed containers solve two problems at once: they cost nothing, and they add character that a row of identical plastic pots simply cannot match.

The rule is simple. If it holds compost, drains freely and will not poison your plants, it can grow something. What follows is how to choose, prepare and plant up the household items most of us already have lurking in cupboards and sheds.

Before You Plant: Drainage, Cleaning and Preparation

Drainage comes first, always. A container without holes will fill with water, sour the compost and rot the roots. For metal tins, turn them upside down on a solid surface, place a nail where you want the hole and tap it firmly with a hammer — three or four holes in the base is plenty. For thicker metal, a drill with a metal bit is quicker. Ceramic mugs and teapots need a masonry bit and a little patience, and it helps to place a strip of masking tape over the spot first so the bit does not skitter across the glaze.

Glass jars are trickier because they crack easily. If you want to use them, drill slowly under a trickle of water, or use them as cachepots with a smaller plastic pot hidden inside. A neat alternative for tins is to fill the tin with water and freeze it overnight, then hammer a nail through the base — the ice supports the metal and stops it denting.

• Wash everything thoroughly in hot soapy water and scrub off old labels and adhesive.
• Never use containers that held paint, weedkiller, motor oil or anything labelled hazardous.
• Rust is inevitable in tins, so either seal the inside with a coat of exterior paint or treat the tin as a cachepot and slip a plastic pot inside.
• Drill or punch holes before you fill anything — doing it afterwards risks cracking the container and losing the compost.

Everyday Items That Earn Their Keep

Once you start looking, the candidates multiply. These are the ones that work particularly well in small UK gardens and on windowsills:

• Clean tins — baked bean, tomato and biscuit tins are ideal for herbs, chillies and compact salad leaves. Tall tins suit chives and parsley; wider ones take a clump of thyme.
• Chipped mugs and teapots — perfect for succulents, small alpines and trailing plants such as ivy or mind-your-own-business. A teapot with the spout intact gives you a ready-made drainage channel.
• Old wooden crates — line with a piece of old compost sack or hessian, leaving a few small gaps, then fill with compost. Excellent for cut-and-come-again lettuce, radishes and spring onions.
• Colanders and cutlery drainers — already full of holes, so they need no preparation at all. Lovely for strawberries and trailing herbs.
• Jam jars and kilner jars — use them for rooting cuttings on a bright sill, or as miniature terrariums for ferns and moss.
• Wellies, trugs and old drawers — good for a colourful display of nasturtiums or pansies, provided you drill drainage holes first.

Choosing the Right Compost

Small containers hold small volumes of compost, which means they dry out fast and run out of nutrients quickly. A good multipurpose compost is fine for a single season of herbs and salads. If you want a container to last two or three years — a shrub in a crate, say, or rosemary in a deep tin — use a loam-based compost such as John Innes No. 2, which holds moisture and structure far better.

Put a shallow layer of broken crocks, gravel or even screwed-up newspaper in the base to stop the holes blocking with compost. Mix in a handful of horticultural grit for anything drought-tolerant, and consider water-retaining granules for tins and mugs that sit in full sun. Never use garden soil on its own: it compacts, drains poorly in a pot and can bring in weeds and pests.

Watering, Feeding and Day-to-Day Care

Check repurposed containers daily through the growing season — a bean tin in June can dry out in a single warm afternoon. Water until it runs from the drainage holes, then empty any saucer or jar lid beneath within half an hour so the roots are not sitting in water. Grouping pots together creates a slightly damper microclimate and cuts your watering by a noticeable amount.

Feeding matters too, because compost nutrients are used up within about six weeks. A liquid tomato feed every fortnight from late spring through to early autumn keeps herbs, salads and flowering plants going. In winter, raise containers onto small feet or tiles so they are not standing in puddles, and move frost-tender pots against a sheltered wall.

Matching Plants to Pots and Pulling It Together

Scale is everything in a small space. A tiny mug wants a single succulent or a small sedum; a crate wants a row of lettuces; a deep tin wants a chilli plant or a compact bush tomato. Think about height as well as width — a tall tin of chives behind a low colander of thyme gives you a display rather than a row of pots. Repeat a colour or a material two or three times across a windowsill or step and the whole thing looks deliberate rather than improvised.

Above all, do not be precious about it. A little rust, a faded label or a hairline crack adds to the charm, and if something fails, you have lost nothing but a bit of compost. Start with one tin and one mug this weekend, and you will soon find yourself eyeing up the recycling bin with fresh interest.