After seeing the billionth hanging plant holder on an interior design blog, I decided to take a little break from work yesterday to finally make myself one (because it's only been on my 'When I Get Time' to-do list for ages). And because I had a freshly charged battery, I figured I'd take pictures and share. You've probably seen one of the dozens of hanging holder DIYs on Pinterest, so obviously this idea isn't new!
1. Decide what you want to put in your hanger, and how big it will be. It doesn't have to be a plant; it could be a dish to collect keys, mail, soaps in your bathroom, etc. Then get your supplies together! You will need: some type of strong string (I used leather because I had a lot on hand), some type of ring (I had this old brass circle brooch, and I cut off the pin back and filed it smooth), scissors, and you can use any decorative beads or tubes if you choose (I was going to then decided to keep it simple). *If you decide to add beads or tubes, you will need to add those before you add your knots!
2. Cut eight lengths of string, or leather, or whatever you're using. The length you cut depends on how long you want your hanger to be. I cut mine about 5 feet long, and my hanger is about 2 feet long when finished.
3. Get all four pieces of your string together, and pull it through your ring so that your ring is in the middle of your strings. You should now have eight ends hanging below your ring. Tie a basic knot in your strings below your ring.
4. Decide how far down you want your knots to start, then start knotting! Just make a simple knot with two of your strings, move on to two more, and continue until you have four knots.
5. Move down and continue knotting your strings. This time, use one string from a previous knot, and one from another knot. You don't want to tie a knot with same two strings from the knot above.
6. Finish the bottom off by tying a simple knot. Make sure it's nice and tight so it won't come loose from the weight of your planter!
7. Hang that b*tch up! I found this hook somewhere among some other things, and I have no idea why I had it, but I set it aside thinking maybe I could use it one day. And now I have. Also, it's going to be a little more difficult to get your plant situated in the hanger if you have long vines hanging down. This part was a little tricky since I was aiming for minimum plant mutilation.
That was the finished project until I had to pull a Danielle, and try to readjust the knot at the bottom without taking the planter out first. I paid less than a dollar for this vintage planter, so it's not like I'm out a light bill or anything, but I really loved it, so I was pretty pissed with myself. From DIY success to maximum destruction in no time.
What started out as a free DIY since I had all the supplies at home has turned into one that will cost me a few bucks as I now have to buy another planter (I went through a purge last year and got rid of all my indoor planters thinking I'd never use them again). Oh well, we live and learn (or in my case, we live and break things and don't learn how not to break, but instead learn that breaking sucks).
So there you have it - you can ruin your DIY just as fast as you can create it. I really should've seen it coming though, considering I'm kind of known in my house for being the one to accidentally break lots of perfectly good stuff.
