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DIY: Pallet Plant Shelf On The Fence For Vertical Gardening
This DIY project brings together simplicity, functionality, and eco conscious design to create a vertical garden using a recycled pallet mounted on a fence. Perfect for small spaces, balconies or kitchen gardens with limited ground area, a vertical pallet plant shelf is an excellent way to maximise gardening potential while adding rustic charm to your outdoor space. With just a few basic tools and a little creativity, this project transforms a standard wooden pallet into a shelf that attaches securely to a fence, offering an efficient and eye catching solution for growing herbs, flowers or small vegetables.
The goal of this build is to utilise reclaimed materials to create something beautiful and practical, while encouraging sustainable gardening practices. The vertical design not only saves space but also makes plant care more accessible and organised.
By repurposing a pallet and turning it into a thriving vertical garden, this project highlights how upcycling can lead to creative, low cost gardening solutions that are both functional and environmentally friendly. It’s a win for green thumbs and green living alike.
Using 1 pallet we cut up the wood to make several usages, first some lawn edging, I say some because we have a large section to cover and will need maybe 3-4 more pallets to finish that off. Secondly we made a pallet shelf that holds 22 10” pots.
What Did We Use?
Just 1 Pallet: no other fancy equipment used, I am always so worried that Clayton will plug something in and get hurt so we only have basic hand tools, so just sawn off.
We had left over fence paint so everything gets painted black, not only to preserve the wood but to help keep some heat in for the evenings and it always looks great as a backdrop for plants.
Free Pallets: Always make sure when you are collecting these to use around your garden you check the stamps.
NOTE ON PALLET USAGE:
Check your stamps on the side and only use HT KD or DB
HT : Heat Treated or KD : Kiln Dried
Heat treated or kiln dried pallets are great for DIY work because the wood has been hardened and is less susceptible to swelling and shrinking.
DB: Debarked, EPAL or No Stamp
Untreated ‘national’ pallets – you can tell these because they either have no stamps, symbols or codes on them, or the stamp just says EPAL.
This pallet was super old and cracked but I didn’t want to waste them, I’ll replace them out when they fall apart with a better pallet ends, but for now they work great and are already seeing in their second year of useage. Use what you have available to you!
USING THE END PIECES AS WINDOW STYLE BOXES
These were cut off scrap pieces that I knew could be used for something else
Screwed them straight onto the fence
Painted & filled them with 22 10” pots! Easy
These would be great filled with herbs or strawberries. Just added some left over marigolds for a pop of colour here too.
We’ve used them to pot on some extra sunflowers, store plants that we were using to propagate, and display flowers.
So many uses for this simple project.
We are using 10″ coir pots here, the coir absorbs the water so you don’t dry out and hold some moisture a little longer for you. We use coir products for our pots.
Pallet Ends For Window Style Boxes Video Reel 2022
Pallet Ends For Window Style Boxes Video Reel Update 2023
Still up and going strong!
Pallet Ends For Window Style Boxes Video Reel Update 2025
Happy Gardening!
Katrina & Clayton and family live in East Ayrshire and share their daily life in the garden on instagram. They practice permaculture principles in the garden, reducing & repurposing waste whenever they can. Katrina shows how home educating in nature has helped Clayton thrive.
Clayton Completed The 2 Grow and Learn Courses with the Royal Caledonian Horticultural Society This Year. Clayton has just turned 17, Autistic, Non Verbal & has been Home Educated for the last 7yrs. Katrina & Peter both hold their PDC Permaculture Design Course from Oregon State University
They featured on BBC Beechgrove Gardens Ep23 2022 and returned in 2023 for an update,Katrina & Clayton are also columnists for ScotlandGrows Magazine, Guest Blog for Caledonian Horticulture as well as working with Gardeners’ World Magazine and many other brands.
They are also Author of the new Children’s Book Series: Clayton’s Garden Journey: Stories of Autism and Gardening. Topics on Growing, Harvesting, Sowing & Composting and 108 Page Weather and Seasons Weekly Gardening Record Book available on Amazon and Kindle. Listen in on their Guest Podcasts to learn more about them.
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Author of the new children’s book series: Clayton’s Garden Journey: Stories of Autism and Gardening and Sowing, Growing, Weather and Seasons Weekly Gardening Record Book available on Amazon and Kindle
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