Last week I finished my latest quirky garden project: a model village built inside a laundry basket.
Actually, it was supposed to be in an old suitcase. But despire multiple layers of waterproof paint the case buckled as soon as I left it out in the rain. I found an old, shallow laundry basket in a local charity shop and used that instead.
Ingredients:
- container suitable for outdoor use (I used a shallow plastic laundry basket from a local charity shop)
- buildings (I got mine for £1 each from a charity shop)
- plants (Pratia pedunculata alba, Heinaria glabra, Sempervivum tormulin, Sedum x rubrotinctum, all from local garden centres)
- potting compost
- horticultural grit
- black sand
- plastic lawn edging
- cobbles
- miniature plastic train set (I got mine from a local steam railway, £2.90)
- plastic dinosaurs (set of 4 reduced to 25p, Wilko)
- blue tile (£1, Flying Tiger)
- small stones (I used some from elsewhere in the garden)
Method:
- Mix together sufficient sand and grit to fill the container to the desired level. Allow extra for features such as hills if required. Fill the container and sculpt hills / features. I used cobbles as a retaining wall for my hill.
- Position railway line and plants where required.
- Cover the surface with additional grit.
- Place blue tile where you want your lake to be, covering the edges with grit to make a more natural outline. I used small white stones to give it a more finished look.
- Create a road: make a border using strips cut from plastic lawn edging pushed into the grit, cover it with black sand and smooth down with a spoon.
- Position buildings. I added some plastic dinosaurs just for a bit of fun.
And here it is with the train running:
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