Reusing My Garden Furniture

My garden furniture is 8 years old, and I really haven’t taken the care of it that I should.

It was on my list of things to do for a long time, so when I hired some gardeners to do some work, stripping and retreating it was high on the list.

Without going into details I have already covered elsewhere, they did a shoddy job of it – they didn’t strip it at all, but merely painted it with FENCE PAINT. Plus they did it as it began to rain, and then decided to finish the job, in the rain.

As a result, while the table. benches and chairs are still reasonably solid, their finish is ruined.

My new handyman said the best way to deal with them was to rub them down and paint them an nice colour, and if he wasn’t in lockdown (which I have no argument with), I would have gone with it.

However, I am considering an alternative. Use the furniture for a more basic purpose, where the appearance is less important and, when I am again in a position to entertain, buy new furniture for eating outside.

Here is the first re-use – using one of the benches as a stand for tomato growbags.

This does several things.

• The ground underneath needs to be dug out and re-gravelled, following my rear neighbours new fence being done. At the moment, it is a mound of earth and gravel, and not completely even. When we get round to this, it will be far easier to move the bench (with two people!) then to move growbags in the ground.
• I am still not sure how Katie the beagle will react to items containing soil on the ground. Before the veg troughs were covered, she would happily jump up and have a dig. So this gets the growbags off the ground
• Although my back is currently very good, I want to protect it, so raising the bags just a couple of feet will help me do it, and make sure I have no excuse not to tend the plants.

The other bench is going to be similarly used, but to raise pots and planters off the ground – either here in the garden, or perhaps in the side-yard.

The table I intend to give a good scrub and possibly paint, as my handyman suggests, but then moved into my BBQ area as a work bench, which I dearly need. I may investigate getting a removable steel plate to make a nice clear prep area. However, clean chopping boards, plates and bowls do the same thing a bit cheaper.

The two chairs, I am planning to use… as chairs.

EDIT: Later the same day… this is at 4pm, with the sun the other side of the house. Still sunny at the end of the garden, probably until 5pm for the pots, and 6-7pm for the tomatoes.

(Actually, it is now 6pm and they are both still in sunshine)