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At the heart of the ILFJL Collective is a simple…
Plant Share For All: Cultivating Community Wellness
The ILFJL Collective is driven by a fundamental belief: how we care for our most vulnerable reflects the true health of our community. We believe that love and compassion should be accessible to everyone, and this philosophy guides all our…
A DIY Kratky Container Series Using Recycled Materials Part 2: Preparing the Base Housing for Your Growing Medium
In Part 1, we covered the basic materials you’ll need to start building your own Kratky-style indoor growing containers using easy-to-find recycled items. In this article, we’ll walk you through creating the base housing—the section that will hold your growing medium and support root development.
We use three 500ml water bottles to create the growing chambers. These will serve as individual plant holders, filled with clay pebbles, small stones, or clean gravel as your growing medium.
Start by:
Removing all labels from the bottles so you’re left with clean, clear plastic.
Cutting an "X" across each bottle cap. This allows the plant stem to pass through while still holding the medium in place. You’ll notice we've raised one section of the “X” slightly—this helps keep the medium from falling into the water while ensuring good water flow to the roots.
Set the caps aside for now—we’ll use them shortly.
Next, we separate the top half of the bottle from the bottom half. Here’s how:
Look for the first ridge just above the widest point of the bottle. Most 500ml bottles have a consistent shape with ridges that make it easy to cut cleanly.
Use scissors to carefully cut along this ridge. Once separated, the bottom half can be discarded or recycled—we won’t need it.
You’re now left with the top portion of each bottle, which will act as your plant holder. Simply screw the caps (with the X cuts) back onto these tops, which will soon be filled with your growing medium.
These will be placed into the larger container in the next stage, but for now, you've completed the section that will support your seeds as they grow into harvest-ready plants.
In the next article, we’ll show you how to build the seed starting dome and nutrient reservoir—all using simple recycled materials. You’ll see how the parts come together to form a stable, effective, and nearly free indoor growing system.
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