How to Make a Whiskey Barrel Planter

Stacy Davis
by Stacy Davis
5 Materials
$100
4 Hours
Medium

I found a picture on Pinterest that I loved as a garden inspiration project. It was fun and whimsical and just the “perk up” that my yard needed. And it had birdhouses, which I love! I used to visit a group board on Pinterest called Grace and Whimsy Guest Gardening Board and it always made me happy. This

project proved a bit more difficult than I had anticipated. This was mainly because I wanted everything to be removable so that I can change the decor and flowers easily with the seasons. I have some red, white and blue birdhouses to swap out for the Fourth of July. In the fall, I plan to fill it with pumpkins. I have some fun Halloween repurposed wine bottles to put on top instead of the birdhouses, too. What are seasonal decor ideas that you would incorporate into this planter?

I went to Home Depot and bought a whiskey barrel planter and a 4 by 4 post. While I was there I also visited the cull pile and picked up some boards for next to nothing. It is a good place to check out if you go.

I cut the 4 by 4 post into 3 staggered pieces. I used 2 1/2 ft , 2 ft and 1 1/2 ft as my measurements. I set them in place to play around with positioning.

I attempted to build birdhouses and failed miserably so I bought some at Tuesday Morning.

I positioned my flowers and determined that I needed to add a base to make my posts taller. You could also buy a longer 4 by 4 or two 4 by 4’s but I thought it might be easy to boost these up to the right height.

I used a piece of scrap plywood to build a base.

I cut a square piece and then took off the corners so it would sit on top of the pieces of wood that were in the barrel.

The front of my planter rests on the top of the whiskey barrel and I used a fence board to hold the back of the planter.

I painted the posts with black fence paint.

I put it together but felt like something wasn’t quite right. I posted a question in the Question and Answer section of Hometalk and asked for opinions on the birdhouse colors. After hearing everyone’s answers, I decided to repaint parts of them. The project was becoming really complicated so I didn’t paint them as much as I would like to.

I used a bright blue on all of them to tie them together.

I spray painted some spindles from Habitat for Humanity fun colors.

I put each of the birdhouses on new base. These would allow me to attach and remove them easily from the posts.

I replaced the dowel perches with quirky perches. Repurposing handles and knobs make fun little perches and also add some additional character to the birdhouses.

Surprisingly, super glue works great to attach the perches.

The spindles are just soooo pretty. I think they are one of my favorite parts. They look beach and all about summer to me.

I added a top to each of the posts.


I have lots of pictures of the assembly process so if you have a question, just ask. I probably have a picture explaining it. I put our house number on the planter but because of the metal band and the curve, it didn’t turn out well and I am going to rework them. Originally, I was going to put the house numbers down the middle spindle. Which do you think would be better? Middle post/spindle or planter?

All done!


Because of the metal bands and the curve of the barrel, the address numbers didn’t work great but I am problem solving that tomorrow.

It is so colorful, it makes me happy! 😊

And everything is removable and easily changeable.

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3 of 11 questions
  • Sharon Sharon on Jun 09, 2020

    Absolutely adorable.....love it!!

  • Donna Makowski Donna Makowski on Jun 17, 2020

    Really cute!!!!!

    Maybe I missed it but - did you attach the bottoms of the 4x4 pieces to the plywood?

  • Al Pagano Al Pagano on Jun 10, 2022

    How about adding a few cheap solar lights?

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