How can I reuse or recycle broken teapots?
We’ve had an email from Hester, asking:
what can I do with a teapot with a broken spout?
You could give gluing it back together a go — it’s not quite as much of a safety worry as say, gluing a broken handle back onto a cup/mug but there is still the risk of scalding if it comes off again at an inopportune moment.
So other less hazardous suggestions? Almost needless to say, teapots make very fun plant pots or utensil/pen pots. Depending how much of the spout remains, you could use it as an indoor watercan too.
The china/pottery from completely broken teapots can be used for drainage at the bottom of plantpots – although if the lid is intact and you’re buying another similar size teapot to replace it, keep the lid as a mix-match spare.
Any other suggestions?
Yeah, can I have the lid please? I’ve got a really nice teapot that’s been a plant pot all its life because it doesn’t have a lid :-(
I can never think of broken pottery without thinking about pique assiette.. You can cover any object with broken pottery, use some grout to set it and voila you have an unique work of art/craft. I’ve seen birdbaths, garden benches, shelves, and even whole pieces of furniture covered with it. The teapot’s handle and spout could be unique features in a birdbath ! Just google pique assiette and you will be in for a treat!
Now you made me want to smash all my odd, worn, and cracked pottery – which will leave me without anything to eat on! :D
If it still look reasonably nice, you could use it to store tea bags in. (We usually buy tea bags in bulk, and the larger boxes are awkward to put in a cupboard so we only have about half a box-worth out at a time.) That could be kind of cute, maybe.
Collect some broken teapots and make a teapot garden…place the pots, fill them with planting soil & plant them with forget-me-nots, zinnias, petunias etc.
Keep yarn ball inside, with a yarn coming out of spout when you are knitting.
Use it to disperse seeds when planting.
REuse the lid to cover something else.
Hang it by a handle on a branch ( without lid). Makes nice bird house.
Turn it into a bird feeder.
you could always have a game of Hillbilly Darts
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/group.php?gid=133298766701170
I know this is an ancient thread, but when I recently found this site, I couldn’t stop poring over the archives. Maybe that’s true for some of you. If you want drainage in a planter made form an old teapot or mug, you can drill a hole in the bottom. The only problem is that it works better with a large masonry bit, and I hesitate to suggest that anyone go buy one for such a project. I hope you can borrow one, or just try a regular drill bit. If you placed the hole on the bottom of the pot, near the edge, just under the spout, you might be able to make a tipsy tower like this one, but with teapots. I believe this tower was cited in another RecycleThis post.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Tipsy-Pots-Tower-Planter/step4/Step-4-Finish-Stacking-and-Plant/
Use it to water house plants.