Pots & Planters for your Front Door

My front door. In this picture you can see glazed pots I found at the garden centre, a Yorkshire terracotta pot, a vintage refractor pot (with the fern) and several Capi-lux egg pots.

I often write about the pleasure I get from the pots next to our front door.  They’re a collection of evergreens, small shrubs and seasonal lovelies and I love creating, caring for and admiring them.  Something always catches my eye as I pass; yesterday it was Sarcococca (an evergreen winter-flowering shrub) which is beginning to bud and promises scent and flowers in deepest winter.  I could go on and on about plants and, in fact, have done that in other posts.

But this post is about pots because the containers we use make the most enormous difference to how the display looks.  I’m fussy about my pots.

Think about the style of your home

When you’re choosing pots think about your home.  What will suit it?  Look at the style, colour, texture.  Is it period and cute with soft terracotta or stone like my old cottage or perhaps it’s painted render or old brick like a Victorian house.  A modern house will suit a crisper clean look than a soft old thing.  

Think about layering them up, wider and taller at the back of the display, with an uneven grading down towards the front.  A bit of variety in pots is nice for a lived in, more casual look.  

Three Predominant Styles

I currently have three types of pots in the main and I’ve come to this over the years as I’ve moved.  Our first house was an arts and crafts 1924 semi chalet bungelow - pretty with bedrooms in the roof.  It was rendered and painted white with the corner brickwork picked out in deep grey (changed from the blackout it was when we arrived).   

For that house I chose pots from the Capi-lux collection by Capi- europe.  They are a dark grey terrazzo style with a clean line and are relatively light as well as UV resistant and come in a wide range of shapes and sizes.  I like the modern lines which actually suit anywhere and I still love the Egg Planter for this cottage where I mix them up with another couple of styles to soften the look.   Not cheap but the most long lasting of the different ones of this type that I have tried over the years.

This is my £35 dustbin which came with a lid - see right. I love the patina. and it was a bargain for a pot this size.

And this is the lid planted up with sempervivum, Erigeron daisies and Ajuga and topped off with gravel. Notice the lovely green watering can on the left and the bath I use as a pond on the right (handle just showing).

Vintage is Fun - Galvanised

Vintage has become such a big thing and very good that is too as it’s sustainable and fun to find.

My new favourite are galvanised, the more bashed the better - I bought an old 1950s dustbin with lid in Margate this summer (to my husband’s surprise) for £35 recently and have turned it into two planters by drilling holes in the bottom.  

The dustbin is now home to a Magnolia stellata and Erigeron which was unhappy in a smaller pot - I’m hoping it’s going to re-leaf in spring as it was looking pretty sad - and the lid how displays a lovely collection of small alpine plants living in a gravelly mix topped off with gravel.  They are both a very lovely addition to my plant collection. 

I’ve also got a galvanised dolly tub with a pretty rotten bottom (cheaper to buy and great for drainage) which, this summer, housed a large dahlia surrounded by cosmos. 

Smaller pieces are fun and practical too; I’ve recently added a couple of old galvanised buckets with handles which add interest at the front of my collection and add to the layered effect. A casually placed bashed old painted watering can adds another layer and helps set the scene.

I bought these last online, another place for great finds, from my friend and client Sam at Vintage Curator Interiors. Check out her website for a changing variety of all things vintage - she’s very inspiring.

And here’s a lovely plant stand from Garden Trading with vintage terracotta pots and a vintage wooden tray.

And Terracotta…

With it’s gorgeous patina and soft shapes vintage terracotta is a delight too and I’m enjoying building my collection. It began, amazingly, when a neighbour was moving and offered me some ‘terracotta pots’ which turned out to be two trays of the sweetest little one bulb pots that had been her mother’s.  I mainly use them for display though am occasionally tempted to give one away with a viola or bulb planted in it.   I recently solved the problem of not being able to use them in the house (beause of the drainage hole) when I found a pile of old terracotta saucers for £2 each at a vintage fair.  Happy me! 

Larger vintage terracotta can be pricey and the pots available are not huge at all but the ones I have add a lovely softeness to my displays. Check out Garden and Wood and Long Tom Pots for inspiration.

A Great Day Out Too

I had a lovely time at a couple of fairs this summer enjoying a fun day out and getting home with a lovely haul. Search out the fairs local to you - I promise it’s a great activity and they often have the added pleasure of good food stalls and music. The ones we enjoyed this year were The Beale Park Decorative Home and Salvage Show and The Henley Decor Fair.

Buying New Pots

Modern terracotta can work too and the colour softens before too long - a bit of yoghurt painted on is reputed to speed the process though I’ve never tried it.   Over the last couple of years I’ve added quite a few Yorkshire Pots to my collection and chose them for the pots in the greenhouse.  I use them for tomatoes in the spring and summer and then plant them up with bulbs which I pull out just in time to use them again for tomatoes seedlings in May.   It works well and, though still quite bright in collour, they have a nice shape and were not expensive.  You can’t buy from them direct as they sell to garden centres but I’ve often seen, and benefitted from a 2 for 1 offer when they end up good value.  

Whichford pots are the dream supplier of handmade terracotta pots and you can visit them to choose your own.  I’m pretty sure they have a marketing agreement with Gardener’s World as they’re the gorgeous pots Monty uses. They are costly though especially in the big sizes.

Other suppliers I rate online include: Crocus - who have a great selection of all things garden including high quality plants, Garden Trading who sell stylish homeware far beyond items for the garden and Sarah Raven, best known for her wonderfully colourful plants combinations but also good for containers and stands.

I hope I’ve inspired you to get moving with pots for your entrances; they’ll lift your heart I promise if you choose some seasonal lovelies among a more permanent framework of evergreen and you will love the time you spend creating them. It’s like that saying ‘do something today that your future self will thank you for’.

Plants for your pots

Pots particularly come into their own in winter - that’s when we are potentially least in touch with our garden and having a display close to the doors makes it easy to connect with them whatever the weather. Check out these posts about winter pots and winter planting.

Enjoy! And do please comment and let me know how you get on…