Friday afternoon turned out to be more productive than I thought it would. We finished embedding all the magnets we have, which means we have 25 planters either done or drying and ended up with 3 installed on various surfaces to see if they survive the rain this weekend.
If they turn out, I’ll order some more magnets, but in the meantime we’re still working on stencils (the BCL stencil above was just a test), and we should be able to get the rest up in the next week!
Owen over at Windsor Visuals also already made a great post on Friday’s Office Hours, and some of his photos are included in this post as well.
Darren, Owen, and I started working on making some more new planters.
We decided there needed to be more layers on the planters to increase their strength and help to maintain their shape.
The wheat paste mix—1 part flour, 2 parts water, some salt.
The first couple of planters drying in the sun.
I started working with Athena and Rosina on reinforcing planters made last week and adding magnets.
Me, Athena, and Rosina working on reinforcing old planters and embedding magnets.
The planters from last week varied in thickness, but it was a delicate balance to add the magnets while not making the planters themselves too heavy.
Owen discovered what happens when wet planters with magnets are placed too closely together.
While there were some planters drying, Darren started on a stencil. While we’re still trying to figure out what should be on these planters, we started with BCL.
Rosina started cutting another BCL stencil in mylar.
Drawing on the tracing paper underneath and then cutting the mylar on top.
My Xacto knife was pretty dull.
Found some spray paint I had hanging out in my studio (auto-body quality).
The work table (we need a dedicated space).
Outside Darren held down the mylar stencil with sicks.
The mylar may end up being difficult to work with on the planters surfaces, which aren’t completely flat.
The stencil.
The planter with BCL stencil.
Darren and I started filling the sprayed planters with soil.
Meanwhile, a couple preliminary spots for the planters were tested.
The test planters lined up.
Darren and Rosina go over the amount of seeds needed for a planter.
Darren adds soil to the planters.
The wildflower seeds.
Rosina adds seeds to three of the test planters.
Darren adds a bit more soil.
Athena has the water ready.
Athena soaked the planters pretty well, as it wasn’t supposed to rain until Saturday or Sunday.
Athena adds water while Owen reviews his last shot.
One of the test planters installed on the pole near the side entrance to Lebel.
We tried against a fence.
Then on the pay and park machine, but there wasn’t a lot of magnetic surface on it.
We settled on putting one planter on the no parking sign at the edge of the Lebel parking lot.
We tried a couple spots at the back of the school too.
We settled on some of the old iron fence beside the entrance at the back of Lebel.
Related Posts: Seeds in the Planters, Waiting to Grow A Mess, But We’re Closer Planters – Take 2
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PS, sorry again for spray painting your hand!
No worries! It came off after some scrubbing. We should definitely try some different colours for stencils, I think Michelle has a bunch of paint.
next time instead of using stencils, we should try cardboard block printing. i’ve been experimenting with it a lot lately. it works great on shirts and other cardboard (both of which have varying service textures), so i think it would be good on the planters. i’m going to really really try to make to the next meeting. i’ll bring some cardboard and acrylic paint to experiment with.
That’s a good idea. We should try that this week. I think the toughest part about doing any stenciling or printing on these is that the surface for the paint is uneven. What paint colours do you have?
If it’s that uneven, I’m sure we can try to touch them up a bit. I have a ton of colours, lol. reds, blues, greens, brown, yellow, orange, black, white, purple, etc.
this is the process i used to print with fabric paint on a shirt, but it will basically be the same for the planters, just smaller:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/explode_myself/sets/72157617239455851/
That looks great, we should definitely try it.
When I checked back at Lebel today, only 1 of the planters was still there (the one on the no parking sign). The planters left near the rear entrance and side entrance were gone.
ooooh that is exciting! i wonder where they are.
[...] finished putting soil and seeds into the magnetic planters and set them on a sunny window ledge to start germinating. We figured the planters would stand a [...]
[...] examples of the group’s initiatives are its Text-In-Transit panels, seed bomb program, magnetic street planters, and community gardens. Starting this September, the group will embark on an ambitious public light [...]