When visitors arrive at your home, the first thing that they see is the porch. If you have one that is, which I’m assuming you probably do if you’re reading this article, or at the very least you will have one soon.
Essentially, your porch is like an introduction to your home.
Your home is kind of an entity in itself, and so the porch will be like the first impression that it gives to anyone who is about to come inside.
It’s also one of the few parts of the house visible from the street and as such, will be all that most people will ever see of your home. So you want to make your house seem like it’s going to be an inviting and comforting place for visitors, but also be a pleasant visual addition to the environment.
This is where you and your proclivity for DIY come in. There are endless possibilities for you to turn your porch from something very common and ordinary into a place that is beautiful and welcoming for visitors but where you can also relax and watch the world go by.
Here’s a few unique DIY ideas that can help to achieve that effect:
Make Your Own Porch Furniture
If the kind of DIY you’re into involves a lot of woodwork, then you can just make some furniture from scratch. Every good porch should have a few places to sit, so you could make some wooden chairs.
Depending on the size of your porch, there are a few different kinds that you can make. Firstly, just a couple of armchairs that you can put on either side of the door would be pretty easy projects that anybody could makeover the space of a weekend or two.
You can get pre-cut wooden boards and just nail them together or you can do all of the measurements and cutting yourself. You could also repurpose an old pallet into a chair or two which is a common practice among woodworkers nowadays.
You’ve also got the ever-popular porch swing. These are also good for fitting onto even a small porch, and if you decide to make one from scratch you have the extra challenge of working with a length of chain or a thick, hemp rope.
In a similar vein, you could make a hammock chair, which would involve ropes too but wouldn’t have much wood involved. You would instead by working with some kind of net, canvas, or nylon.
And if you have a big enough porch, you could build a sectional sofa, which would give you a lot of space to lounge and is a fun and rewarding project.
Get Creative With Lighting
Lights will be an essential aspect if you want to sit outside on the porch on some of the warmer nights during the summer. Especially if you wanted to read a book out there or hang out and chat with some friends or family.
There are numerous ways to light a porch, but the more creative you get with it, the more fun it will be and the more interesting it will look to visitors and those who are passing by. One really interesting option would be to use mason jars.
The idea of hanging mason jars is relatively new but there are already so many different innovations. You can go for the relatively quick and simple option of using some reshaped wire hangers or just resting the jars on tables with candles inside and some fabric covering.
Or you can build a wooden brace which you can then fix onto the wall with a metal hook to attach to the jar. You could also use a length of rope to thread around the ceiling of the porch and hang the jars from there.
If you don’t want to use mason jars, there are other options too. You could build your own wooden lanterns, you could repurpose plant pots into lightning fixtures or you could even use wine bottles wrapped with string lights.
Craft Unique Plant Holders
Speaking of plant pots, another thing that every porch needs is exactly that, some plants. You can of course, just stick some plants in pots and call it a day, but that’s no fun is it? You want to get creative.
Well, the options are endless with this too. I love the idea of repurposing something that isn’t normally used for plants. Something rustic like a wooden barrel or maybe an old-fashioned metal bucket.
Or you can take this a step further and hang plant pots from the ceiling. This isn’t all that difficult of a job either and really what it amounts to is getting the hang of attaching hooks to the ceiling as well as threading a chain or a thick rope through the pot or basket you’re using.
And then there are some really unique ideas like this tree branch ladder. This one is really cool because all you need to do is cut down some tree branches.
And if they look a little bit gnarled or lumpy it adds to the effect.
The idea is that you lean this ladder in a corner so it doesn’t need to have much of a strong base to it and you will be hanging the plant pots from the cross-steps so they only need to be able to hold a small amount of weight.
So there are some really cool ideas that will make for fun and challenging but also really rewarding DIY projects and there’s no reason for you to stop there. You can also knit rugs, install curtains, make seat and cushion covers, there are tons of ways to make your porch beautiful.
