Flower Pots From Hard Hats

3 Materials

$20

1 Hour

Easy

How about a Super Mario Brothers - inspired hanging garden?

I found these cheap hard hats at a store. I doubt that they are to code so unless someone bought them to sing ‘YMCA ‘... When a friend of mine heard that had I bought some, she mentioned that she had some used ones laying in her garage. Used ones would be even better but you would have to spray paint them first to get rid of the scuffs.

Remove the hammock

I’m not sure what proper safety hats look like inside but the hammocks of these could be removed quite easily by sliding them out of their brackets.

Drill holes

I drilled some drainage holes - for the first time ever! When I video-called the husband to check whether I was using the right drill bit, he looked a bit like you do when letting a pre-schooler play with matches.

Learnings for 1st time drillers (and for the power-tool veterans, don’t you dare snigger!):

It growls a lot but it doesn't bite. Mostly.
Use the right drill bit (see below, of course I have no idea what the technical description is).
Hold on tight to everything except the turning bits with both hands. Wear your glasses so that you can actually see which bits are moving.
Put the hat down on a non-slip surface like your lawn if you don’t have a work bench.
It may take longer than you think to drill through.
Once you are through, the drill lurches down so brace yourself, you don’t want to damage the surface underneath or the bit, which is why I thought doing it on the lawn would work. I am told that you can also wrap tape around somewhere in the middle of the bit to prevent this.

Prepare to hang them

I used plastic hangers with clips that you can get from a garden centre because I liked the bright colours and they very easy to use and reposition. You could also drill holes in the rim and hang the hats with rope. Just do all the drilling before you plant the plants. I added my clips only after planting because otherwise they are in the way whilst adding things to the planters.

Bottom layer before adding plants &soil

Plant

I added as much potting soil to my gently unpotted Plectranthus plants as I could. I started with some soil at the bottom, then the plant, then more soil and then added a layer of palm pip/husks that are accumulating in the garden. And water to test my beautiful holes.

Hope they make for good mulch

Hang

The red hats and green plants really pop against charcoal background. Nothing old-fashioned about these!

If you live in a hot climate and the dark wall is sun facing it may irritate the plants because it retains too much heat and they will grow away from it. On the other hand, the dark colour may work to your advantage if you need to heat things up.

Or you could go for a more traditional look.

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4 of 42 comments

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Flipturn
on Jul 18, 2020

I've seen cheap priced hard hats at thrift stores that have company names, promo slogans, etc. on them.

A touch of spray paint, or patterned duc tape would make short order of the words, then the hats could be used for this project.

2
Reply
- Thea
  on Jul 18, 2020
  
  Thats a great idea!
  
  1
  Reply
Mary Radley
on Aug 4, 2020

I did this several years ago with out of spec hats. One each of red, white and blue. They hung for several years on a handcrafted plant hanger post. Everyone that stopped by said how clever. Enjoy!

Like
Reply
- Thea
  on Aug 5, 2020
  
  Oh did you? Great minds think alike!😃
  
  Like
  Reply

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Flower Pots From Hard Hats

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