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DIY Pallet Garden

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Info & Care Sheets

DIY Pallet Garden

Pallet gardens have been all the rage! These gardens are a great way to add color and interest in small spaces. They are also great if you are tired of the same old container gardens and pots. Let’s start checking off those items and ideas you’ve pinned on Pinterest, bookmarked, or added to the ‘to-do’ list.

What you need:

Staple Gun – borrow one from the neighbor if you don’t have one at home. It makes the project much easier.
Pallet - Buy one at our Garden Center in St. Paul!
Landscape Fabric – or something similar. My piece was somewhere around 8’ x 7’.
Soil – I used 2-40 quart bags of soil and then a little more for good measure
Plants – Pick anything you like, make one for sun, shade, veggies, herbs, fruits, etc…

Here’s how it’s done:

Step 1. Find a Pallet No two pallets look alike. Pallets can be heavy or light, new or old, painted or unpainted, etc. The beauty of pallets is that each one is unique. Don’t worry about what it looks like too much, it will be covered in plants by the time your finished with it. We now sell them at our Garden Center in St. Paul. The one I have is a particularly beat up pallet. I chose this one because I wanted to show that even the ugliest of pallets can be turned into something beautiful! Go ahead and clean it up a little bit. You can scrub it down if you feel the need. I removed a few boards and pulled out some rusty nails.
Step 2. Cover the Pallet in Fabric I used an old scrap of landscape fabric that our landscape department deemed unusable. It was an awkwardly shaped piece but it worked out perfect for what I was doing. You’ll want to use a similar fabric type, something strong that will allow water to drain through. I’ve seen a few others that used burlap but I wasn’t sold that it would be strong enough to hold all that soil.
Step 3. Secure the Fabric to the Pallet I have never done this before, so I used an obscene amount of staples. Start out by stapling the fabric to both sides of the pallet. I stretched mine so that it was tight, but not too tight to pull the staples out.
I decided not to staple my fabric all the way to the front edge of the pallet because I didn’t want the black fabric to be too noticeable. Once I finished my first line of staples, I flipped the excess material over the edge and stapled it to the back of the pallet for extra support. (Like I said before, I used an obscene amount of staples on this project!)
This is what my pallet looked like after I finished stapling the sides. I had a lot of excess fabric to work with for the bottom portion, which turned out to be a good thing because I didn’t exactly have a plan for that part yet…
I debated a few different ways to do this part but ended up trimming my fabric and cutting a slit down the middle so I could maneuver around the center board of the pallet.
Next, I wrapped the fabric around the bottom board. Each flap went up and over the bottom board and was stapled to the top edge. If you figure out a better way to do this, give it a try.
“Hmmm, I better add a few more staples over here… just in case.” One side done, on to the next!
I secured any extra fabric to the back of my pallet in the hopes of getting extra support. I also decided to staple the fabric to the top of the pallet.
It’s ready for some soil!
Step 4. Add Soil Once you’ve got your fabric secured, you can fill up your pallet with soil. I had 3 of our 40 quart bags of Linder’s ProThrive Potting Mix. I used 2 full bags and then maybe ¼ of the third one to top it off.
Step 5. Add the Plants! Now for the fun part! I chose three different types of plants: 1. Alyssum 2. Flowering Cabbage 3. Petunias I chose plants that wouldn’t get too tall. I started with the shortest plants near the top and then gradually worked my way down mixing in a few of the shorter plants in with the tall ones here and there. Do you want to know the trick to pallet gardens? Put a lot of plants in there! The more plants you add, the more roots there will be to hold the soil together.

Step 6. Let It Grow

After you plant everything in the pallet, leave it lying down for about a week. The roots of the plants play a major part in holding all the soil together, so give them sometime to grab on. I moved mine into the rocks to avoid killing the precious grass it was laying on.

After you give it some time, slowly stand the pallet into a vertical position & enjoy your beautiful garden!

pallet garden