Recycling a Coffee Table to Get Porch Produce

Being budget-conscious can bring out our creativity. This pretty but broken coffee table was headed to the landfill. But instead, it serves to hold future produce. And what's great is it cost pennies to transform.

My brother and his girlfriend brought home a cute 70's style coffee table that they found at the dump. It was solid and in good shape, except for the three missing square glass covers that were supposed to cover the top.

I convinced my hubby to build and attach a wooden tray on top of that table to hold some grow bags.

He first built the tray; then he attached it to the table; then he painted everything using a paint spray gun.

The bottom of the tray was not waterproof. It needed to be waterproof so that the plants in grow bags can absorb water from the bottom.

So I lined it with heavy plastic and secured it with staples towards the top of the tray.

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The corners were a bit tricky, but I found that by securing the sides first, it was easier to fold the corners into place.

The depth of the tray is about three inches - too deep to hold grow bags. Three inches of depth could cause plants in grow bags to drown. Ordinarily, by drilling a hole about half an inch to two inches from the bottom, excess rainwater can drain from the tray. 

But since the tray-table is protected by an outdoors ceiling, I decided not to punch holes in it.

In the next blog post, I explain why I decided to use my second-floor porch to grow plants, which plants I selected to put into my new table-tray, and why I selected them.

I hope this project inspires creativity to reuse old furniture to give them a "second life," and delay going to landfills. 

Thank you for checking out this post. Please leave your questions and comments below.

TigerLily