Here Are Some Tire Planter Ideas For Your Porch

Tires are obviously a key component to any vehicle. Without them, your car, van, truck, or bike becomes nothing more than a giant hunk of immovable metal taking up space in your garage or driveway. What may not be as obvious, is the fact that they can also make for exceptional planters. All you need is a little ingenuity, and you’re good to go. We’ve come up with a list of ways that you can give a tire a productive life when its days of wrapping around your car’s wheels are through.

1. The Standard Tire Planter

The most “basic” tire planter design is the one that needs the least bit of setup. Essentially, you are picking a spot in your garden to place the tire and shape the garden within its hole, and you put it there. Once that happens, you’re pretty much good to go.

Although you can get away with just putting a regular tire in your garden as-is, it’s typically a good idea to paint it a different color; one that goes with the overall aesthetic of your garden. This hue will add a unique character-driven pop to your garden, not to mention that it will make for a pretty fabulous conversation piece.

2. Give Your Tire Some Hang Time

If you have a barren wall that you are dying to give more character, a couple of tires can be your saving grace. As the above video demonstrates, this tire planter concept is made up of equal parts gardening, DIY construction, and art. However, if you’re game to break a little sweat for the pursuit of something beautiful, this may be right up your alley.

One thing worth noting here is that if you’re using standard car tires, you already know you’re working with something large that’s going to take up a healthy chunk of space. As such, you’ll want to take a little extra time making sure these tire planters don’t end up making your wall too crowded or busy.

Another thing to consider here is the type of plant that you want to use in this unique planter. If you’re planning on growing a plant whose foliage will droop downward, you may want to make sure it has enough room to grow without interfering with other plant life. Again, you don’t want to make your garden too busy.

3. Get Into the Swing of Things

Of course, you don’t need an empty wall to take advantage of using a tire as an elevated planter. Another neat way to repurpose the tire into a plant holder has its roots in the classic piece of makeshift childhood entertainment, the tire swing.

If you’ve ever set up a tire swing, you already know how to mount this unique tire planter. All you need is a sturdy place to hang the tire and some plants, although you’ll want to make sure that wherever you hang it isn’t subject to a lot of foot traffic. You’ll also make sure you give plenty of room for the plants to grow if you’re growing a drooping variety.

4. Tire Stacking

When you have one tire, you may feel that your planting options are limited. Fortunately, that isn’t the case when you have a few tires at your disposal. Creating a stack of three of four tires will give you the opportunity to grow plants and even crops, since you’re essentially creating a deep bed of soil.

What’s more, you don’t need to worry about creating any supplemental structure that would otherwise prevent them from falling over. Tires that are stacked together stand their ground very sturdily. Besides, you’re going to pack the inside of this rubber column with dirt, which will provide further fortification.

5. Turn them Into Art

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You don’t necessarily need to keep your tire planter traditionally tire-shaped to use them in your garden. If you have a little ingenuity, you can turn an ordinary tire into an extraordinary sculpted work that’s perfect to show off your plants.

The cool thing about turning tires into sculptures is that you’re not necessarily beholden to keeping them as planters. If you’re particularly creative, they can double as pieces in a sculpture garden. Or if you just want to stack them and paint them red and black to mimic the look of a ladybug, that will work fine, too.

6. Turn Your Tires Inside-Out

Tires are meant to be sturdy road-huggers designed to keep you safe on the road. As such, it may be perfectly easy to forget that they’re made of rubber and contain rubbery properties. They do, and this gives you a license to have some fun with the way they’re shaped.

For instance, you can slice their exterior and bend them back to create a flowering effect, which could make them an extra attractive option to consider if you’re thinking of planting a flower bed. You can also cut them in half and treat each half as wall-mounted planters. This may particularly be a good idea if you’re into wall-planter concept but lack space for a full tire.

7. Tires of Different Shapes and Sizes

You don’t have to stick to car tires to add some rubber to your garden. Any tire will bring character to your backyard, whether it’s a couple of bike tires used as a trellis or a fat tractor tire for a large-scale planter project. Coloring and shaping these types of tires also will add various accents of character to your garden.

At the end of the day, these circular tubes of rubber represent the kind of ingenuity that makes gardening worthwhile. With a little paint, a little garden space, and some plant life, you can turn something as mundane as a tire into something magnificent. It’s a tactic cool enough to remind you why you got attracted to gardening in the first place.

Photo Credit

Photo by Tony Buser licensed under CC BY 2.0

Photo by JacekAbramowicz licensed under CC0

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