{"product_id":"reclaimed-stave-wood-bucket-planter-terracotta-pot-c-1980-2010","title":"Reclaimed Stave Wood Bucket Planter with Terracotta Pot, c. 1980–2010","description":"\u003ch3\u003eThe Piece\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA small bucket-shaped planter: a sleeve of weathered wooden staves bound with two wire hoops, with a terracotta pot standing inside it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThe staves are vertical and tapered, narrowing toward the base so the whole thing reads as a coopered bucket. They are bleached to a pale silver-white on the outside, with the grain standing proud and the ends cut square. Several carry long drying splits, and one is sprung out of line, leaving an open gap down one side.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eTwo hoops of round galvanized wire run around the outside, upper and lower, each closed with a twisted hook.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA thin galvanized wire bail arches over the top, hung from two stamped sheet-metal ears fixed to the rim with wire staples. Threaded onto the bail is a length of natural stick as a grip — barkless, fibrous, split and insect-bored.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eInside stands a plain terracotta flower pot with a rolled rim and a drainage hole in its base. The inner faces of the staves carry a reddish-brown bloom where the pot has rubbed against them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eHistory \u0026amp; Provenance\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eTurn it over and the identification settles itself, so it is worth doing before anything else is said about this piece.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThere is no wooden bottom. The staves form an open sleeve from end to end, with no base board, no croze groove cut to receive one, and no trace that one was ever fitted. The terracotta pot is the vessel — it sits down inside the sleeve and its own moulded foot is what you see when the piece is inverted.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eSo this is not a coopered bucket, and it is not an old bucket that lost its bottom and gained a pot. A cooper’s bucket is built around its base: the staves are grooved to take it, and the hoops are driven down to squeeze the joint watertight. Nothing here was ever built to hold water. It was built to hold a flower pot.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThe hardware says the same. The hoops are round galvanized wire closed with a twisted hook, not the driven flat bands of a cooper. The bail hangs from stamped sheet-metal ears fixed with wire staples, and the grip is a natural stick pushed onto the wire rather than a turned wooden roller. All of that metal is bright, with only light spotting, while the wood beside it has weathered to fibrous silver over a great many years. The two do not share a history.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eWhat you are buying, stated plainly, is old wood in a newer assembly. The staves are genuinely weathered — that surface is decades of sun and rain, not a stain or a wire brush, and it is the reason the piece looks the way it does. The bucket form around it is decorator work.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eOn the evidence of the bright galvanized hoops and bail, the machine-stamped ears and the standard terracotta liner, the assembly is offered as c. 1980–2010. Nothing on the piece is marked, stamped or labelled anywhere, and nothing narrows it further.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eIt is worth adding that the form being copied is a real one. The stave-built bucket with wire or band hoops and a swing bail was the ordinary water, milk and sap vessel of American farms into the twentieth century, and it survived in the decorative vocabulary long after galvanised steel and then plastic had replaced it in the yard.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eProduct Details\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003ctable\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eObject\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eBucket-form planter — weathered wooden stave sleeve with a terracotta pot liner\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eConstruction\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eTapered vertical staves forming an open sleeve with no base board; two round galvanized wire hoops with twisted hook closures; thin wire bail on stamped sheet-metal ears fixed with wire staples; natural stick grip threaded on the bail\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eLiner\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003ePlain terracotta flower pot with a rolled rim and a drainage hole, standing loose inside the sleeve\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eDimensions\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eApproximately 6 in tall and 6 in across at the rim, excluding the bail\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eTimber\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eSoftwood staves, bleached silver-white with the grain raised; browner and stained inside\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eMarks\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eNone. No stamp, brand, paint or label anywhere on the wood, the hardware or the pot. Offered unattributed.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eEra\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eAssembly c. 1980–2010, on the hardware — bright galvanized wire hoops and bail, machine-stamped sheet-metal ears and a standard terracotta liner, all showing far less age than the wood beside them. The staves themselves are older reclaimed weathered timber, and the two are not the same date.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eCondition\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eSound as a display object. The sleeve holds together on both hoops and the terracotta pot sits securely inside. The wood is heavily weathered, which is the point of it: silver and fibrous on the outer faces, with long drying splits through several staves, softened ends, and insect boring in places. One stave is sprung out of line and leaves an open gap down one side; the hoops still hold it. The bail, both ears and all the staples are present and firm. The stick grip is split and bored and will not take weight. The terracotta pot is intact with no chips or cracks, with earth staining inside. Not a watertight vessel and never was. Condition Guaranteed.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eAvailability\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eOne of a Kind — 1 Available\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003e\n  \u003ch3\u003eWhy It Belongs in Your Home\u003c\/h3\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eBuy this for the surface, and know exactly what you are getting: genuinely old, genuinely weathered wood, made up into a planter you can actually use.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThat silvered, fibrous, split stave-wood is the hard thing to find. Most rustic planters on the market are new pine stained brown, and they look it from across a room. This is wood that spent years outside, and the grain standing proud of the surface is something no finish reproduces.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eThe practical part is the liner. A plain terracotta pot lifts straight out, which means you can plant into the pot rather than into the wood, water it in the sink, and drop it back. Nothing rots, nothing leaks onto a windowsill, and you can swap the planting seasonally without touching the sleeve.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eAt six inches it takes a four-inch nursery pot almost exactly — a fern, a small ivy, a pot of herbs on a kitchen sill, paperwhites at Christmas, or a succulent if you want something that forgives neglect.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eEmpty, it works just as well as a holder. Wooden spoons and spatulas beside a stove, brushes on a desk, secateurs and twine on a potting bench, cutlery on a table laid outdoors.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eAnd the palette asks nothing of a room. Silver-grey wood, galvanized wire and terracotta belong together and belong with almost everything else — linen, stoneware, painted board, zinc, old iron. In a farmhouse kitchen, a garden room, a porch or a shop display, it does its job without arguing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eA note on care. Do not carry it by the bail with the pot in it. The grip is split and bored right through, the wire is thin, and the sprung stave means the sleeve is not carrying load evenly. Lift it from underneath.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eNever water the plant while it is in the sleeve. Take the terracotta pot out, water it, let it drain properly, and put it back. Standing water against weathered stave-wood is the one thing that will take this piece apart.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eKeep it indoors or under cover. It has had its outdoor life already, and another wet season would start losing staves.\u003c\/p\u003e\n  \u003cp\u003eDo not oil or seal the wood. Oil turns weathered silver to blotchy brown and takes out the whole character you are paying for. A dry brush is all it wants.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Viridian Eclection","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48061541449833,"sku":"VE-1623","price":145.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0651\/0093\/9369\/files\/385FB2E9-1146-44B5-8B73-8C4619A2BD60_4_5005_c.jpg?v=1789467401","url":"https:\/\/viridianeclection.com\/products\/reclaimed-stave-wood-bucket-planter-terracotta-pot-c-1980-2010","provider":"Viridian Eclection","version":"1.0","type":"link"}