Vertical Pallet Flower Garden

I absolutely love my Vertical Pallet Flower Garden.  It is complete with it's own irrigation system!!!  Have you seen Home Depot's commericial that shows their vertical garden project?  Well, a couple friends of mine were talking about it and I went to their website to check it out.  Well, I thought...why not make it out of an old pallet?!  Much easier and cheaper!  Check out my inspiration here. 

Click Read More for How I Did It...

Materials and Tools

1 pallet, mine was a half pallet measuring approx. 2' x 3.5'

2 sections of 2 x 4 the same height of pallet

1/2" PVC piping, 1 section the full height of pallet and 2 sections 1/2 that height

3 - 1/2 PVC end caps

PVC pipe cutters

Drill

1/8" drill bit

3/4" wood drill bit

Screwdriver bit

Lattice, cut to the size of the your pallet

Weedblock fabric

Staple Gun and staple

Scissors

Potting Soil

Wood Screws

Utility Knife

Flowers

How I Did It

1.  I had the Hub cut 2x4s the same height as my pallet and used screws to secure them on the ends so that my pallet had sides.

2.  I enlisted the hub again to drill holes with a 3/4" wood drill bit so that the 1/2" PVC piping would fit through the holes for the irrigation system.  It is important to keep the holes as straight as can be so that the PVC fits.  You may want to drill a little bit bigger holes if you are inexperienced. 

The Hub made three holes total in what would be the top of the pallet.  One in the center that that would allow a PVC section to go all the way down to the bottom section of the pallet, a second hole was needed in the midsection of the pallet since there is a support piece along the center that you can see in pictures below.  The hub drilled two more holes on either side of the center for PVC piping that would be placed for the upper section of the pallet. 

Please note that steps 2, 3 and 4 kind of happened all at the same time so you may need to scroll down to see all the pictures. 

3.  We cut the PVC piping to fit.  Again, the center section had a pipe that goes the entire length of the pallet that will provide water to the bottom section of the pallet.  The two side pipes stop at the half way point and provide water for the top section of the pallet. 

These holes are where you will provide water to water the vertical garden. 

4.  I had the hub cut off the pieces of wood on what would be the front of the pallet along the sides so that I would have more planting area.  He cut these with a Sawsall because the staples in the pallet were so deep that he didn't want to pry them off and have other pieces some with it and have to rebuild the pallet. 

Again, steps 2, 3 and 4 all happened together that's why the pictures don't give a clear discription. 

5.  I drilled holes in the PVC piping using a 1/8" drill bit.  I only drilled holes in the bottom section of the center pipe, this will ensure that the center pipe only provides water to the bottom section of the pallet.  These holes will allow water to disperse when watering from the holes in the top of the pallet. 

6.  I removed the PVC and began to install the weedblock fabric.  This was tricky.  I unrolled the fabric and layed it out on top of the pallet.  I started at the one end and stapled the fabric to the lip and inside wall of the pallet, I made sure that there was enough fabric at the corners so that the fabric could be folded and stapled without coming up short of fabric.  I had to piece an extra section at the bottom because once the fabric was folded into the pallet, it was too short to cover the entire pallet.  I once it was all stapled in, I kept enough fabric so that it could be folded over on top of the pallet. 

7.  I cut holes in the fabric and fit the PVC pipes back into their respective holes.  I fastened the end caps on them as well.  I did not use any PVC glue. 

8.  I filled the pallet with potting soil.  I wet it down to help it settle so that the dirt was really packed in tight.  I wanted to make sure that not much settling would occur went set upright.

9.  I folded over the weedblock fabric and stapled around the enitre pallet, keeping the fabric tight. 

10.  The Hub secured the lattice around the edges with screws. 

11.  I used an utility knife to make slits in the fabric and planted my flowers in the openings of the lattice.  I had extra flowers so some openings had two, I kept those ones towards the center of the pallet. 

12.  I watered generously and left the pallet out flat for a couple weeks to let the flowers take root before up-ending the pallet.