How to Create a Fairy Garden

Many people have heard of fairy gardens, but if you haven’t you will be amazed at the wonderful ideas available to add interest to your patio, deck, porch, and garden. This is a fun hobby that’s guaranteed to get you hooked! Both children and adults love creating their very own fairy gardens.

If you’re not exactly sure what a fairy garden is. It’s a lovely way to create a miniature garden of make-believe. Using your imagination, you can create a world of wonder.

You use different plants that you want to have in this garden – but in this world, these plants take on a different meaning to the fairies. Instead of being just ordinary plants, they become a home to the fairy or shady places just like a real-life large tree is for a human.

A Fairy Garden Can Be Created Indoors or Outdoors

The great thing about a fairy garden is that you don’t have any limitations whatsoever, except maybe budget because it’s hard to resist some of the tiny accessories out there..lol

It can be as large as you want it to be. It can be as small as you like. The garden can be very elaborate with what you put in it or it can be simplistic in design.

If you choose to create an outdoor garden, then what you can do is either have your fairy garden be directly in a patch of soil in your yard or you can use an outdoor container.

So, if you’re going to create it outdoors on the ground pick out the place where you want your garden. Be sure it’s in a spot with good sunlight according to the plants you’ll be using and that no pets can dig it up.

With container gardens outside you want to place them in an area recommended for the type of plants you use.

Neat Container Ideas

The great thing about using a container is there are so many types of containers that can be used; you don’t have to limit yourself.

Clay pots make good fairy garden containers. These can be painted on the outside to reflect the magical world they contain. But what you can also do is to use a broken or halved large clay pot. You can show different levels of the fairy living just like you see with homes built on cliffs or rocks. The reason for this is because it gives that small make-believe world feeling that fairy gardeners look for.

Try using old metal beds, plastic suitcases, vintage steamer trunks, or wheelbarrows! You can often find these at a fairly low cost. You might want to stroll a local flea market or garage sale and specifically look for fairy garden finds there!

Some people have used wagons, old doll beds, and other containers. Any item that you like, especially one that could have some kind of childhood sentimental meaning for you or your own children, can be used to start your fairy garden.

You want to keep in mind when you’re picking out your container just how much you’re going to want your fairy garden to grow. A word of warning though: because it’s such a fun hobby and because there are so many cute decorations that you can get for it, you’re going to want something that’s a fairly good size or you’re going to want to do several smaller ones.

If you do decide to go with a container, it has to have a drainage hole. While most pots for plants do come with pre-drilled drainage holes, some of them don’t and you’ll have to actually open these up yourself or choose one that has them already built-in.

Whatever container you do choose to use, you’re going to need to get some small rocks to line the bottom of the container because this will help the water drain out. You don’t want the roots of your plants to get saturated with water and stay that way because you’ll get root rot

The Soil and Plants for Your Fairy Garden

Choose a good potting soil, one with a pH balance as well as nutrients needed to make whatever plants that you use grow better. Add potting soil to your ground soil as well. You can get this at your local garden shops.

Plants – When picking out the plants, choose ones that remain fairly small otherwise they will take over your container and block out all of your fairy world decorations. you want to avoid ones that are creepers.

Miniature ivy, miniature conifers, thyme, oregano, and moss are good for fairy gardens. If you use moss, you’ll want to go with Irish moss because this kind looks like an actual yard for your fairies.

You can also use plants like brass buttons or baby tears to give your fairy garden an enchanting appeal. You want to be careful about choosing plants such as flowering ones that attract bees.

Miniature Ellwood or Port Orford Cedar trees look like tiny Christmas trees and are a cute addition but you will have to keep this one pruned back.

Decorating Your Fairy Garden

There are so many choices and themes out there that you can buy. There’s just something magical about these tiny little items. You can look for a fairy garden starter kit and those will usually have some basic furniture in it. They’ll have things like tables or benches, some fencing, a birdbath, and could also have a fairy included, but some of them might not, so you’ll have to check.

The good thing is that you can add to your decorations as you go along because you can get a ton of pieces separately. Some fairy gardens contain miniature items like bicycles and gazing globes.

There are even cute little garden tools and wagons. You can also get main decoration items like little cottages or houses that are homes for your fairies. The fairy figurines are too cute!

You can find little male or female fairies and you can create their whole little world in your garden. What some people have done is after they put in the soil and planted the plants they wanted, they put a little house in.

Along the path to that house, they laid it with stepping stones or faux brick walkways. They even had a tiny lamppost lighting the way to the front door of the little house.

You can even find whimsical things to put in your fairy garden like little pink flamingos and miniature birds’ nests. If you’re letting your children create the fairy garden and you want to see how well they tend to it before you put money into decorations, you can fashion decorations right out of things from nature.

You just need bendable twigs and some twine and you can fashion benches or arbors. What some people also do is once they have the fairy garden made, then they put a little picket or wire fence around the entire decoration to make it look like the garden is the fairy’s landscaping.

The key is that there isn’t a right or wrong way to do this as long as the container or area will be able to sustain the plant life. Anything that you can imagine for a real-world can be found and used in your fairy garden container. This is a great hobby for the whole family to enjoy!

Enjoy!

Bernita