The Cull: 10 Inexpensive Garden Storage Products that Do Double-Duty Indoors

Here at The Organized Home, we’re all eyes, all the time for products that serve double duty—as whatever the object was originally designed for and as a covert storage container. (Examples? A stainless steel fustis as a Laundry Detergent Dispenser, a pine crate as a File Cabinet, and a towel bar as a Slipper Rack.)

In today’s edition of The Cull, we take our organizing-freak eyes to the garden nursery. Here are 10 easy-to-find outdoor items that we’re constantly bringing indoors:

Leaf Bags

You can find reusable lawn and leaf bags in a variety of materials, but most have a few things in common: They’re waterproof, durable, and collapsible, making them perfect for indoor chores like collecting recycling or storing garage gear.

Garden Trugs

Quintessentially English, the garden trug was designed in the early 19th century for gathering vegetables, herbs, and flowers in the garden. Two hundred years on, they’re as popular as ever, and as useful indoors as they are outdoors. In the kitchen, it can hold fruit, onions, or garlic; in the entry, it can hold mail and keys. It can even hold babies.

Above: A set of three wooden Sussex Trugs is $74.24 at Amazon. (See 10 Easy Pieces: Garden Trugs for more.)

Garden Tool Bags

You don’t have to spend much time in the garden to know a carryall for your tools is a necessity. What’s not immediately obvious is the multipocketed bag’s myriad uses around the house: Turn yours into a kit of cleaning supplies or use it to stash and carry your kids’ portable art supplies. (My mom used hers to store dog grooming gear—go figure.)

Trug Tubs

Let’s get this out of the way: They’re plastic. But Fiel’s classic garden trugs are made in Spain of 100 percent post-consumer recycled plastic, and we like them for rounding up your household’s less delicate items, like firewood or recycling, with aplomb. (They’re virtually indestructible.)

Terracotta Pots

Think of these as cheap, plastic-free, general-use vessels that always look good, indoors or out. I use a few four-inch pots (I painted them in Farrow & Ball colors) to keep spare flatware handy in my kitchen for extra guests.

Plant Stands

These come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and we like them because they tend to be more compact than a typical bookcase or shelving unit.

Garden Markers

The stick-style markers might have limited application inside the house (except, perhaps, in houseplants). But the hanging kind has any number of uses indoors: Write directly on them to label trash and laundry bins, assign storage to individual family members, and identify pantry contents.

Plant Trays

If you’ve followed us for more than a day, you know we can’t stop talking about trays. (Our latest sermon: In Praise of Trays: 10 Trays in Fiberglass and Enamel.) They’re undeniably useful for corralling just about anything, and plant trays tend to have deep sides.

Plant Caddies

Buy yourself some flexibility indoors by putting heavy storage items (such as toy chests, tool cabinets, and dog food containers) on wheels.

Steel Buckets

Though I’d like to imagine myself using steel buckets to feed my (nonexistent) horses, I’m really using them as trash cans, for hand-wash laundry, and to keep drinks cool during parties.

For more storage inspiration from the garden, see:

• Urban Gardener: A Greenhouse for Your Balcony
• Storage Solution: A Customizable Garden Shed from Germany
• DIY: Small-Space Vegetable Garden