I recently started aspiring to become a plant lady. There, I said it.
Its been a slow start though. Currently, I have a few succulents, one fern that seems to dislike me, and a very health pothos that loves my laundry room. And this week, a friend gave me a teeny tiny fiddle leaf fig that she propagated from her lovely and mature fiddle that lives in her plant haven of a living room.
Naturally, I want this fiddle leaf fig to blossom and grow into a mature tree, so what better place to start than to build it a custom plant stand?
I happened to have a stone planter left over from a Pinterest party that I snagged from Hobby Lobby’s clearance aisle. I held onto it knowing I would be able to use it one day and when I came home with my new plant, I immediately dug it out of my supplies cabinet. I’ve seen wooden plant stands pop up on some of my social media channels and this seemed like the perfect application to try a DIY plant stand.
Supplies
- (2) 7/8″ x 36″ wooden dowels
- 1″ x 3″ x 12″ wood (same species as above)
- Wood glue
- Kreg pocket hole screws
I purchased my round wooded dowels from Lowe’s and had the rest of the supplies already on hand. I do suggest buying the same species of wood for the legs and the cross-pieces, here I used oak. From what I remember, my Lowe’s had oak and poplar dowels, so just make sure to check the tag and buy a corresponding 1×3 (especially if you plan to stain your plant stand or leave it natural). If you plan on painting your plant stand, this is not necessary.
Process
Okay, let me just start out by saying this project would have been a lot easier had I used square or rectangular dowels, but I really liked the look of the round dowel and well, what can I say, I love a good challenge.
First, I cut the dowels to length. My planter is 8 inches tall, and I wanted the top of the plant stand legs to be 6″ above the base of the planter (2″ from the top of the planter) and slightly longer than this length below the planter. So I cut two 16″ pieces out of each dowel.
The most challenging part of this project was figuring out what to do where the leg (round dowels) meet the cross-pieces (rectangular 1 bys). While we could have used a small dowel to attach them, I didn’t like the look of them just butted together. So down the rabbit hole we went….
We thought about notching the round dowel but ultimately decided to alter the end of the cross-piece to fit snuggly against the round legs. We tried several tools, including a router, but found using a 7/8″ paddle bit worked the best.
So, the next step was to take the 1″ x 3″ and bore a hole through the short side of the board using a paddle bit. We used a 7/8″ bit to match the size of our round dowel. It worked best when we drilled far enough from the end of the board that we were drilling an entire circle, so don’t place your bit at the very end of the board and try to just cut a semicircle out.
In order to drill the straightest hole possible, we clamped our board to the base of our drill press to ensure it stayed perpendicular to the drill bit. This can also be done using a handheld drill but I would still highly recommend clamping the board down so it doesn’t move during the drilling process. I also read a tutorial where a Forstner bit was used, we don’t have one in the size we needed (hence the paddle bit), but that would also work.
You should now have a board with a semicircular cove cut out of one end. The diameter of my planter was about 8″ at the widest part, so I chose to space my plant stand legs about 8.25″ apart. So, I measured 8.75 inches from the top of the cove and marked this spot to drill the second hole. This accounted for the thickness of my drill bit (roughly 8.25″ + half of 7/8″) and allowed the legs to be 8.25″ inches apart when I assembled the plant stand.
Once both ends were cove shaped, Andrew used the table saw to rip the board in half lengthwise, so we had two 3/4″ x 1.25″ cross pieces.
Instead of cutting one of these boards in half (& subtracting out the thickness of the other board) and using pocket holes to form the x-shaped base, Andrew decided to take a more challenging route and notch each piece. We marked the center of each piece, then 3/8″ on each side to show the 3/4 inch notch we needed to make.
Using the table saw, with the blade height at 5/8″ (half of our 1.25″ board’s depth), Andrew cut the right edge of the notch, then the left, then kept making passes over the table saw blade until the entire area was notched.
To ensure our cross-pieces were perpendicular to the table saw blade, Andrew clamped them to a longer board so he could use the table’s square as a guide when making the cuts.
We dry fit the pieces into the cross shape, then drilled 1 pocket hole in the underside of each end.
Then we disassembled the cross shape and attached the legs. My planter is 8 inches tall and I wanted the cross-pieces to be 6 inches from the top of the legs, this would allow 2 inches of the planter to rise above the top of the legs. I marked 6 inches from the top of each dowel.
Next we added wood glue on the coves of the cross piece and lined the top of the cross-piece up with the mark on the dowel. We clamped the pieces together, and drilled a screw into each pocket hole. We repeated this for the other cross piece and set of legs. Make sure to orient the cross-pieces appropriately so the notches fit together when you assemble the plant stand.
Now, here’s my ‘ShouldaWouldaCoulda’ for this project. It was very hard to keep the legs perfectly perpendicular to the crosspiece when clamping and adding the pocket hole screw. Thinking back, we could have use a square (a rafter square would be the perfect size here) set in the corner where the leg and cross-piece meet to ensure a 90 degree angle. My planter legs are *slightly* off, but I’m still calling this project a win for the first attempt.
Finally, I added wood glue to the notched areas of the cross-pieces and re-assembled the pieces to form the plant stand. If your cross-pieces fit snuggly together, you can skip the glue – this allows the plant stand to be deconstructed for easy storage later if needed. If you did not use the notch method and instead used pocket holes to connect the cross-pieces (one long piece and two shorter ones), obviously you will have to store the plant stand as is.
To protect my floors, I also added stick-on felt pads to the bottom of my planter legs – you can see them in the bottom right hand corner of the photo above.
I left the wood natural for the meantime, but you could certainly stain and/or add a polyurethane to seal the wood, or paint it.
I have a feeling I’ll be making many more of these as my plant collection grows. They would make great gifts too! Have you DIYed anything lately? I’d love to hear about it. Comment below or connect with me on Instagram @elleandjaydesign.
