How To Build a Simple Garden Water Feature

When it comes to garden water features, let's face it, they are expensive. The most cost-effective and fun alternative is to create one yourself. This is how I designed and made a simple, attractive water feature for my garden for about one quarter of the price of a prefabricated one.

I bought everything I needed in one trip to my local hardware store.

Ingredients:

Firstly I chose two gorgeous glazed, ceramic planter pots, both the same colour, but one bigger than the other.  I checked with the store to make sure that the inside and outside of the pots was waterproof.

Next I bought some sealant especially designed for plugging holes in pots, a small water pump, a small length of hose.

Finally I chose a small plastic pot which I could place comfortably upside down in the larger ceramic pot, and a small bag of river pebbles.

I also made sure I had a bundle of plastic shopping bags, and an outdoor extension cord long enough to reach from my new water feature to the electricity outlet.

Method:

I first took the larger pot and using the sealant, bunged up the drainage hole in the bottom.  It was important to let the sealant dry properly to make sure that it wouldn't leak in future.

Next, using a box cutter, I cut a small archway in the top rim of the plastic pot, large enough for the width of the hose to pass through.  My plastic pot already had a hole in the bottom, but if not,  I would have cut one, again the diameter of the hose.

I then placed the larger pot into its position in the garden, making sure it was perfectly level and, threading the hose through the plastic pot, placed the plastic pot upside down in the larger pot.  I left a generous amount of hose at each end so it was easier to work with later.

Then I took the smaller pot and threading the hose through its bottom hole, placed this pot upright on top of the plastic pot.

So now I had the large pot on the bottom and the smaller pot nested above it, with the length of hose running through the centre.

Holding the hose in a central position in the smaller ceramic pot, and making sure the top end was above the rim of that pot, I solidly packed around the hose with scrunched up plastic shopping bags.  I added bags until there was only about one or two inches between them and the rim of the smaller ceramic pot.

Next, still making sure that the hose remained central, I added the river pebbles to the top of the smaller ceramic pot until the pot was completely full, with the hose sticking out through the center.

I connected the water pump to the other end of the hose in the bottom of the large ceramic pot (taking care not to pull the hose out of the top ceramic pot) and in turn connected the pump to the electricity mains by way of the extension cord.

Finally, I cut off the top end of the hose, leaving only about half an inch sticking out of the smaller ceramic pot.

I filled the bottom pot with water, turned on the pump, and voila!  The water bubbles out of the top end of the hose, fills the surface of the smaller ceramic pot, then cascades down its sides into the larger ceramic pot where it is pumped back up through the centre again.

It looks lovely, sounds beautiful and relaxing, is the perfect colour and shape for my garden, and cost a fraction of the price of the often less attractive prefabricated water features.