Five Fun Container Finishes for Fall

 Five  Fun Container Finishes for Fall

By Steve Hess

 

It’s fun to create flashy colorful finishes on planting containers and they certainly stand out as a definite focal point when needed.  But most of the time its nice to let what is planted in the container be the star and let the container offer a neutral support of the knockout container planting.  Here are five “neutral-ish finishes you can easily apply to terra cotta or hypertufa containers that will preserve their porosity and breathability.

1.        Mud Bath 

Look around your yard and garden for the darkest dirt can find.  Scoop a shovelful or two into a large bowl and add water to make a paintable mud.  Coat the dry container with a thick layer of the wet mud and leave on the container for at least two weeks.  Place the container in the hot sunshine and allow it to bake.  Don’t waste water to clean off the container.  Just plant it up and the rain and will slowly wash away the mud and reveal the nice warm natural stained surface.

2.        White Wash 

Spray the container inside and out with water. Dip a two-inch brush into exterior white latex paint allowing it to enter the paint only ¼ “- ½ “.  This will prevent you from using too much paint at once.  Apply the paint with a light touch using crisscross or cross-hatch strokes.  This will keep the paint from getting into the darker areas.  Allow the container to dry in the sun

 

3.        Green Rub    

Put on a pair of mud gloves  those orange gloves with rubber fingers) and dip your gloved hand directly into exterior latex moss -colored paint.  Just dip the fingers of the glove into the paint.  Run your gloved hands over the surface of the container, allowing paint to rub off onto the container. Apply a heavier amount of paint at the top and create a gradation, gradually reducing the amount of paint until you reach the bottom with no paint at all.  As the paint dries, swipe a moist cloth over the surface to pull off paint from raised textured areas.  You can try two colors of paint as well.

4.        Mosaic Accent   

        This mosaic feature works best on a container with a smooth surface. Decide which        

        area on the containers you like to accent with a focus of mosaic work.  Use urethane

        glue, (E 6000 or Goop) to glue on colored tiles, stones or glass peices.  Allow to dry 

       overnight and grout using sanded grout close to the color of your container.

 

5.        Powder Coat   

In a small plastic bowl mix together 2 cups fine sand and 1 cup of Portland cement.  Then in another bowl, mix 1 cup of white glue with 1 cup Portland cement and enough water to make a creamy paintable mixture.  Lay your container on its side, doing one side one at a time.  Coat the entire surface with the glue/cement mixture. Immediately

Sprinkle the sand cement mixture over the wet surface using a mesh strainer, again, less is more.  When all four sides have been coated, place the container upright and do the top edges going down into the inside about 3-4 inches. Allow to dry in the hot sun.

 

Don't Trash it, Fix It

 Don’t Trash It, Fix It

 

Making new is fun, but repairing something you had for a long time is also a good thing.  

No matter how well you or someone else has made something there comes a time when it crumbles apart, a tree branch falls or a maintenance person mis-steps and a cherished container, stake or stone is broken. When something breaks, it is not always the end.  Here’s a good rule of green thumb: if it break into two or three pieces, it may be repairable, if there are more pieces than that, it is good policy to just let it go.

One reason hypertufa and cement are desirable is that they can be added to and repaired at any time versus something like terra cotta or higher-fired ceramics..  Once ceramic breaks, it can be glued together but will also show a visible sign of breaking.  With hypertufa, you can disguise and heal a break and many times the repair is unnoticeable.

Here’s what to do if you have a broken hypertufa or cement that is in good enough shape to repair. 

 What You Need 

Stiff plastic brush

Soap and water

Urethane glue (Goop or E6000)

Sticky masking tape

1” and 2” flat paint brushes

Sanded grout or sand mix cement 

White glue (Elmer’s)

Trowel and brick

What You Do

1.         Remove all loose dirt and rubble with the stiff brush.

2.        Wash all pieces in a warm bath of soap and water.  Allow to dry thoroughly in the sun.

3.        Assemble the broken pieces together to see how they fit.  If the repair will need propping or weighting to hold in place, get your weighted pieces and /or tape ready ahead of time.

4.        Glue the pieces together using the urethane glue. Watch for oozing or dribbles and wipe clean. Prop and tape to hold together.  Allow to dry overnight.  

5.        If there are larger pieces missing, you will need to mix a small amount of hypertufa to fill in the gaps.  The grout or cement will be heavier and harder to fill a larger gap. 

6.        Mix no more than ½ cup of the sanded grout/cement mix with water and 1 teaspoon of white glue to make a runny paste.  Brush the repaired area with water to moisten the surface and then apply the mix  to heal the broken area.  

7.        Allow the grout to stiffen and then use a clean, dry brush to shape and feather the grout disguising the repaired area. Allow to dry overnight.

8.        Burnish the repaired area with a trowel or brick to blend it with the exiting finish of the container and your piece is ready to back into the garden.

Here is an example of broken and repaired garden art:

Sculpture pieces led back together.

 Hypertufa mixed and used to heal the break line.

Repaired sculpture- You cannot tell it was broken.