Creative Ways to Reuse Old Plastic Bottles

Plastic bottles are an inevitable part of life. Even if you try hard to keep your life plastic free and minimize the amount of plastics you use and consequently send for waste disposal, there will be at least a few plastic bottles lying around your home. If you don’t want to just dump those into the rubbish removal container, here are a few creative ways in which you can reuse your old plastic bottles and turn them into something new, interesting and useful for your home.

Vertical Garden
Old plastic bottles make great flower pots. But if you want to take your gardening game up a notch, you can also try creating a vertical garden. Take an old plastic bottle, cut out a part of its side and use some cord or nails to attach it to the wall you have chosen for your vertical garden. Repeat that with a few more bottles. Fill the bottles with soil and plant your favorite herbs, flowers or plants in them. This is a smart alternative to junk disposal which will let you enjoy a green home garden even if your space is limited.

Bird Feeder
Wouldn’t it be lovely if you could attract birds to your garden? Well, the good news is that this is fairly easy to do! Take an old plastic bottle, drill a hole through its cap for hanging and cut another hole on its side, in the mid portion of the bottle. Attach a wooden perch under the second hole for the birds to stand on, fill the bottle with mixed seeds or another type of birdfeed and hang it somewhere on your porch or in your garden. You will soon notice birds visiting your garden to feed from this DIY plastic bottle bird feeder.

Broom
If you have an old PET plastic bottle that you’ve decided to throw away or send for waste recycling, think again. This can easily be turned into a plastic broom you can use in your home or on your patio. You will need a plastic or wooden broom handle (plastic would be better as it is lighter), an old plastic bottle, a pair of sharp scissors and some glue/string. Cut out the bottom of the bottle and then cut the bottle itself into strips about 1/3- or 1/4-inch wide. Just don’t cut all the way through – stop when you reach about 2-3 inches from the bottle neck. Put the broom handle into the bottle opening and fasten it with some string or glue. If you want a thicker broom, stack up 3 or 4 bottles. Voila – you have your very own DIY broom! Just don’t use it on hardwood or delicate surfaces, as it may leave scratches or marks. Such a broom would be perfect for sweeping your patio.

DIY Chandelier
Another way to reuse your old plastic bottles is to make an eye-catching chandelier out of them. For this, you will need only the bottom parts of the bottles. Cut off the bottom portions of 10-15 bottles of the same size – the more bottles you use, the bigger the chandelier will turn out. Next, use a stapler to attach the bottle bottoms to each other in a cluster. Fit the chandelier cord through one of the holes among the bottles (in the middle of your chandelier) and glue the plastic part of the lamp holder to the bottles. That way, your chandelier will be sturdy and won’t move around. You can make different shapes out of the bottle bottoms – a square, a circle, a star or some abstract irregular shape. You can also use different-colored bottles for a more interesting effect.

These are just a few suggestions for DIY projects you can try with your old plastic bottles. You can use your imagination to come up with other ideas for reusing plastic bottles at home. Just don’t dump them straight into the rubbish disposal bin – make sure you recycle or repurpose them in some way.
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