Cacti + Succulents

I’m as cacti and succulent obsessed as the rest of the internet. I remember visiting a succulent nursery when I lived in Argentina about ten years ago. It was the first time I remember seeing this beautiful type of plant! The gardener showed me how he cultivated new plants from the larger ones. So, last year when I bought a few succulents and they did well I thought I’d try to propagate them.

After several months of the type of non-care/care that succulents need, I had about 30 babies! I’ve planted and replanted my collection several times (including for these baby shower favors), and it continues to grow and thrive.

I thought I’d dress some of my basic terra cotta plants up with a little bit of leather to add some visual interest to the displays, and I love the way they turned out!

Dress Up Your Plants

The process is really simple, and only requires a couple basic leather tools to get started. Let me show you how to make your own leather wrapped planter.

You’ll need:

an empty terra cotta pot
some leather
a paper and pencil
sharp scissors
an awl or leather hole punch tool
embroidery floss or twine and a craft needle
1- Wrap the paper around your pot, crumpling it along the edges. This way you’ll take a pattern for the perfect size wrap. Use the pencil to mark beneath the top edge, and the bottom of the pot. Take note of where the paper below begins, and overlap the top paper edge by about 1/2″ and mark a line.

Your pattern will look like a half rainbow. Cut it out your pattern from the paper.2- Position the pattern on the rough side of the leather, and trace around it with a marker. Cut the leather out along the line.

3- Wrap the leather around your pot and overlap the ends. You can stick it together with a bit of tape to get an idea of how well it fits, and trim any little edges that hang below the bottom. Use a marker to evenly mark some dots along either side of the overlapped section, mirroring each other.

My pot here is tiny, so I needed three dots, about 1/2″ apart each. If your pot is larger, you’ll need more, and maybe a little bit further apart. 4- Use the leather punch to make holes on each of your dots. Knot the embroidery thread after threading it though your needle and begin stitching from the bottom. Go up through both layers of leather, then across to the hole in the single layer. Then repeat on each of the holes.5- Finish by tying your thread off into a knot on the inside of the wrap. Slide the leather wrap up onto the pot and admire your handiwork!

Change It Up

If you want to get fancy with some variations, try stitching in different patterns, or cut a shape or word out of the leather so the terra cotta shows through on the front side!Obviously, this idea will work for any terra cotta planter, regardless of what type of plant is inside. But, you know what they say, “Cactus Makes Perfect!”