Recently, my neighbor across the street moved out and a group of people spent a few weeks cleaning out the house. Over the course of that time they placed several things at the curb that I brought home. One of the neatest things they threw out was this Ethan Allen 4 post bed frame. Of course, it was filthy beyond measure and had a couple of things coming apart, but that's just elbow grease.
I took this picture after I cleaned it and glued the pieces back together, so you can't really see how much work I did there, but suffice it to say that after seeing all the gunk that what was on it I didn't really want to use it in my house for a bed frame. Instead, I decided to refinish it as a garden "bed" frame.
After sanding the whole thing down I gave it a few coats of exterior paint and added a mesh trellis. Inside the bed frame I am attempting to grow a container vegetable garden. I haven't had a lot of luck vegetable gardening in the past, but I am willing to try again! I figure the bed will look really cute with all sorts of vining vegetables growing on it.
A few months later it has some life! Still have some issues with my brown thumb, lol.... I think I need to move the whole thing to a more sunny spot (that'll be interesting with my tomato plant all grown up through it). The bed frame is holding up fairly well to the elements I suppose. We have had a REALLY wet couple of months and some cracks have appeared in the bed frame from the constant moisture. I may attempt to fill the cracks with wood filler and put some more exterior paint on it to give it some more life (if it's ever dry long enough)... but I knew a piece of wood furniture was likely to have a limited life span out in the elements when I started anyway.
Once I get some more landscaping accomplished I plan to move this to a more manicured looking spot with more sunlight. Everything is still a work in progress around here :).
