It’s amazing what you can do with secondhand finds when it comes to home decor and your front porch is no exception! Here are some of my favourite thrift store porch decor finds so far!
If you’ve been following along with me over on Instagram, then you know that we’ve been working on adding a fancy new front porch to our house this summer and things are moving right along! Before I know it, I’ll be adding furniture and planters and really making the porch feel like home. When we added our new side porch last summer, I found that I loved all of the brand new hardware and the crisp white railings, but that it needed a little extra personality on top of all of that newness to make it really feel like a welcoming space. I’ve played around with some different ideas over the last four seasons, but my favourite things to add to our little side porch have been some of the secondhand items that I’ve used. I thought it would be fun today to put together a post with a few different thrift store porch decor ideas while I dream about what I’ll be able to do with the big front porch once it’s done!
Thrift Store Porch Decor Ideas to Try
An Old Chair as a Plant Stand
I got this old chair for $1, and while it’s probably not sturdy enough to sit on, it makes a perfect plant stand! I think I’m actually going to dig this out of the basement again soon because my creeping Jenny in some of my planters is getting a little long and they need to be lifted up.
Cupboard Door Chalkboard
A chalkboard is always a fun thing to have on your porch for seasonal decor because you can easily add any message you like. You can easily make your own out of an old cupboard door and some chalkboard paint. My local ReStore always has a whole bunch of cupboard doors to choose from.
See also: What to Buy From the Habitat for Humanity ReStore
Giant Shutter
This giant “shutter” that I made has been such a great piece to anchor my whole thrift store porch decor scheme. I put it out last winter and I just haven’t wanted to put it away yet because I love how it looks up there! You can read about how I made it out of a secondhand find here: Clever Oversized Shutter Farmhouse Decor
Old Baskets Used as Planters
I discovered the magic of using thrift store baskets as planters last year and I don’t think I can ever go back to regular planters. First of all, baskets from the thrift store are so inexpensive, especially when you compare them with the price of a planter you would buy at a garden centre. They also just add so much character and texture to a porch space. You can read more about using baskets as planters here: How to Use a Basket as a Planter
An Old Lantern Transformed With Paint and White Rope
I never wrote a blog post about this little project, but I noticed that I’ve been using it a lot as I’ve looked back over my photos from the last year, so I thought I’d better give it a shout out. 🙂 Whether you use them for actual lighting or not, lanterns always look right in an outdoor space like a porch. I found a really plain old black lantern a few years ago and last year I decided to update it a little bit with some white paint, a bit of distressing and a rope-wrapped handle.
Old Watering Can
OK, I have to admit that this watering can pictured here actually came from the dollar store, but you can find many similar old watering cans at the thrift store, especially at this time of year. This one was originally really shiny, so I “aged” it using the same simple method I use to age cheap galvanized metal buckets and it looks just perfect. It makes a great garden-themed vase, or you know, you can actually just pick it up and use it to water your flowers. I love a watering can like this that looks cute enough that you can just leave it out all the time when you aren’t using it.
Old Grapevine Wreath Form
I see these often at thrift stores, either with some old faux florals still attached, or just plain. You can remove the old, outdated florals and use the wreath form to create a new wreath for your front door, or you can just use the plain wreath form for a little extra texture anywhere on your porch where you think you need a little something extra. They’re great just tucked in behind a planter full of flowers, or even on a winter porch that might be looking a little dull.
DIY Wreath Stand
This is a great project to use up any little bits of scrap wood that you might have leftover from bigger renovations. This one pictured here are also makes use of a little finial that I found at the ReStore as well as an old hook. I often find one or two wooden finials/fence post toppers like this in the hardware section of the ReStore so this is one fun way to use those!
Old Crate/Wood Box/Sturdy Basket
The “wood decor” section of the thrift store often has a lot of items in this section that can make great plant risers if you turn them over and give them a quick coat of paint or stain. Sometimes just adding a little extra height underneath a planter on your porch is all you need to bring your whole porch-scheme together. As you can see from every single photo of my porch, I use one of these a lot. 🙂
White Painted Mini Urn
This is my newest little piece of thrift store porch decor. I found this little urn at a thrift store and I loved its classic shape and quirky mini size. In the traditional black, it just seemed too small in scale and not-quite-right, but painting it white and using it for a little house plant that I’ll bring back inside in the fall makes it seem more fun and quirky. The white paint trick works well on all kinds of different thrift store planters. From ugly to fun and modern in one step! 🙂
Those are just a few of the things you can do to make your porch more welcoming with thrift store finds! What kind of thrift store porch decor have you found for your own front porch?
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Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.