DIY Wooden Planter Stand

Hello Remodelaholic friends. It’s Home Coming, back again for our first official contributor post here at Remodelaholic. We’re pretty darn excited to join such an incredible team of bloggers and can’t wait to show you some of our latest & greatest projects.

For our first project, we’re going to share how we built these modern DIY Planter Stands for our patio. After coming out of a pretty hefty home remodel, this project was enjoyably simple. Definitely something that you handy folks could DIY without the carpenter husband that I’m lucky enough to have.

How to Build a Wooden DIY Planter Stand

Click Here to Get a Free Printable Version of this Building Plan

Before Justin could get stared with building, I needed to find the perfect planter. Since the majority of retailers are switching out their Summer & Patio product for Back to School (already?!) it took me awhile to find the planter that I was envisioning in my head. We ended up finding these at Lowes.

With that out of the way, Justin was able to measure the specs for our planter stand and start making the pieces. These are pretty large planters, so we decided to have 6″ footings under the base of the planter, and the top of the legs will reach up to 2″ below the top edge of the planer. The X base under each planter will be built so the planter fits snug within the legs. And we’ll be building this in Cedar so it’s resistant to the outdoor weather.

Materials Needed for one planter stand:

(1) 5/4″ x 4″ x 8′ cedar plank (for the legs)

(1) 1″ x 4″ x 4′ cedar plank (for the X base)

Outdoor stain & poly

Brad Nailer & Air Compressor

Router

Orbital Sander

Table Saw

Chop Saw

Wood Glue

Planter Stand Dimensions:

To best showcase the dimensions, I’m going to use two photos. The height of the planter stand is 17 3/4″, and the inside width is 141/4″. We’ll describe how we came to those dimensions in the following steps, based on the size of our planter.

Now let’s get building, shall we?

Step 1: Round the legs

Using a router with 3/8″ (or larger) round over bit, Justin rounded the edges on all four sides of a 1×1″ piece of cedar. The larger the round over bit, the rounder the edges are. He only had a 3/8″ bit, so our legs are more of a rounded edge-square, than a circle.

Step 2: Sand the legs

To help round out the legs, sand the legs with an orbital sander & 80 grit sandpaper, and follow behind by hand sanding it using 80 grit sandpaper.

Here’s what our legs looked like once Justin was done rounding them.

Note: If you’d like to use a stairwell spindle, or have square legs, that would work as well. Round spindle’s don’t come in Cedar, so Justin custom made these for us.

Step 3: Mortising for the Base

Using a router with a 1/4″ straight router bit, cut the mortise (aka, that square hole) into one side of the leg. Justin built his own little jig/template to help cut this rectangular mortise to exactly match the base pieces that will slide into place.

Here’s what the mortise looks like:

Step 4: Cutting out the notches in the base

Measure the center of base pieces, making the notch 3/4″ x 1″ so the two base pieces will slide together flush. Cut these notches using your table saw with dado blades and the sliding table saw guide.

Here’s what all of the pieces look like once they’ve been cut. Two notched base pieces & four mortised legs.

Step 5: Glue and assemble

Put a good amount of wood glue in the mortise of the legs, then slide the base piece into the mortise and nail with a brad nailer and 1-1/4″ brand nails.

Step 6: Slide the two notches together to finish assembly

Step 7: Stain & Poly

To stain and poly these pieces, we took the two pieces apart to make it simpler. After one coat of stain, three coats of poly and ample dry time, re-assemble the planter stand.

And then place your plants & planters in place. You’re done!

These two are the perfect first step in our budget friendly patio makeover, which we’ll be working on over the next couple of months. So what do you think?

Don’t want to take the time to build this, but want a wooden planter stand for yourself? Justin & I are launching our furniture business, Northern Timber, later this month. Follow Home Coming on Facebook for word on our official launch and some great friend discounts!

Want to follow along with our other tutorials and DIYs? Follow us on Home Coming!

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