Planter Projects Flowers Spilling out of Barrel – How to Create this Container Garden – Southern Patio
“Flowers spilling out of barrel” has grown popularity in the past few years in the container gardening world. Outdoor DIY projects are straying more from the norm of just setting a planter of mums on a front porch. Whimsical concepts involving decorative planters have been popping up, taking ordinary landscaping into the extraordinary.
One project that we at Southern Patio have been in awe over is the spilled garden. This idea essentially involves planting in a container outside so as to create an effect of spilling flowers on the ground. We decided to give it a try with our very own whiskey barrel.
get startedHere’s What You’ll Need to Get Started
– Whiskey Barrel
– Shovel
– Eleven 12-packs of French Marigolds (Dwarf) in red/orange, orange and yellow
– Four bags of .75 cubic feet of flower/vegetable gardening soil
– 1 bag of 2 cubic feet of premium brown mulch
Gather Your Materials
With the sun shining on our beautiful April Saturday afternoon and a few items from our local hardware store, we were all set to dig up the front yard for our bed of red, orange and yellow marigolds. We ended up using four bags of flower/vegetable gardening soil, a 2-cubic foot bag of brown mulch, and eleven 12-packs of French Marigolds (Dwarf) in red/orange, orange and yellow.
Dig a Hole for the Planter
The planter is going to lay on its side, so burying it half-deep into the ground will prevent it from tipping over during inclement weather. We chose to bury our planter next to a tree that provides a ton of shade. This creates a sort of hidden planter/spilled garden effect. We began by shoveling about 6 inches of dirt in the nook of the tree.
When planting a garden or creating a flowers spilling out of barrel effect next to a tree, be careful not to hit any pesky roots.
Begin Pouring Soil
After the hole next to the tree is deep enough, place your whisky barrel on its side with the mouth facing outward. This is going to create an effect that looks like the planter is a part of the tree with flowers spilling out of it. Grab a bag of garden soil and start pouring. Place about 6 inches of soil inside of the whiskey barrel and pour on the ground to use as an outline of how you want your flower bed to look like. Your soil should create a shape, extending from inside the container and outward.
Flowers Spilling Out of Barrel Effect
Spilled flower gardens can contain numerous flowers of all genres, shapes, sizes and colors. This is where your creativity is really going to shine in this project. We decided to plant the same type of flower, in a color gradient. We started off by planting red/orange marigolds inside of the container, just close enough to the edge so that the sun can reach them.
You can use a small gardening shovel to dig holes for your plants, or you can just use your hands. We used our hands! We also used a hand to measure the spaces in between planting our marigolds. These were planted a hand’s width, about 3.5 inches, apart. We used three 12-packs of the red/orange marigolds.
We followed this with approximately four 12-packs of orange marigolds and four 12-packs of yellow. When you are planting these, make sure the shape of the overall flower bed is even on both sides.
Pour Mulch and Water the Flower Bed
When you are done planting your flowers and you have achieved the shape that you are aiming for, finish off by carefully shoveling some mulch where the planter and tree meet as well as around the flower bed. We put mulch in between the flowers as well, using our hands. Mulch gives any garden bed a more polished look. We choose brown to create a nice color accent against the orange and yellow hues.
We finished up by taking a ton of pictures of our new, fun “flowers spilling out of barrel” gardening idea and watering the flower bed.
