Almost every container on this page was something else first. A spice jar, a dead light bulb, a thrifted chandelier, a teacup, a wine bottle, a glass cloche made out of chicken wire. That is what these 20 DIY terrarium ideas have in common, and it is also why they cost so little: the glass is free and the plants are three dollars. The other thing they share is a layer order that does not change. Drainage at the bottom, then soil, then the plant, then moss or gravel on top to hold everything down. Get that wrong and the roots rot in a fortnight. Get it right and a closed jar will look after itself for years.
1. Succulent Terrarium
Hens and chicks in a kitchen jar, and the proportions are what make it work. Stones go in the bottom first, then cactus soil until the jar stands about three quarters full, which leaves the rosette sitting proud of the rim rather than sunk below it. Lift each succulent out of its nursery pot and break the old compost away from the roots before it goes in. Then one to two tablespoons of water, no more, and let the soil dry right out before the next drink. The maker ran a batch of these as teacher gifts and wedding favours, which is what the jar count is really for.
Get the full tutorial at Family Food and Travel.
2. DIY Succulent Sand Art Terrariums
Layers of coloured sand poured into a glass jar and a faux succulent pushed into the top, and it takes about five minutes. Pour one colour at a time against the side of the glass and the layer tips at an angle instead of sitting flat, which is how you get the waves rather than stripes. Four or five layers filled these to about three quarters; go thinner and more numerous for something more intricate. The succulents are artificial, cut off their stems with wire cutters, so nothing needs watering. If coloured sand is not to hand, table salt mixed with food colouring does the same job.
Get the full tutorial at Design Improvised.
3. Terrarium Lamp
A glass jug with a removable lid, a hardware store lamp kit glued to the top, and air plants and moss inside. The removable lid is the part that makes it work rather than just look good: glue the lamp stem to the lid instead of to the jar and you can still lift the whole fitting off to get at the plants. Build the landscape in layers, moss to the back, air plants and minerals to the front. Hot glue on its own was too flimsy here and needed reinforcing with a stronger craft adhesive, so use the stronger one from the start.
Get the full tutorial at CraftBits.
4. Wine Bottle Terrarium
Cut wine bottles set over a base as glass cloches, and the scene underneath is built dry, which is why nothing in it ever needs watering. Artificial moss and succulents are hot glued straight onto a jar lid or a candle lid, then the miniatures go in by stages, mushrooms first and then the figures, so each layer hides the glue under the one before it. The bottle drops over the top and can be left loose or fixed down for good. A glass knob or a crystal bead set on the top with E6000 turns it into a proper cloche handle. The bottle cutting has a tutorial of its own on the same blog.
Get the full tutorial at Saved By Love Creations.
5. Beaded Desk Plant
A trailing vine made entirely from seed beads on wire, sitting in a miniature terracotta pot, and it never needs water or light, which is the entire argument for it. Each strand is a length of wire threaded with green beads and then bent into leaf shapes at intervals, and the strands are gathered at the top and pushed into the pot. The weight is what sells it: real beads hang the way a real pothos hangs, where a plastic plant sticks out stiffly. This is the one on the page for a desk with no window, a dark shelf or anywhere a living plant would quietly die.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.
6. Chandelier To Terrarium
Two geometric glass terrariums built from the trapezoid panels of a broken thrift store chandelier, joined with foil duct tape. Not the cloth kind: the reflective aluminium tape sold for sealing HVAC ductwork, which cuts like tin foil and reads almost exactly like the zinc came used on stained glass. Two inch tape cut into three narrow strips trims the panel edges; wrap the top and bottom of every piece first, then lay the panels out into the three dimensional shape and tape the joins. Tape the inside and the outside both, or you see the back of the tape straight through the glass.
Get the full tutorial at The Kim Six Fix.
7. Lightbulb Terrarium
A dead incandescent bulb gutted and refilled with sand, preserved moss and an air plant. The gutting is the only risky part: goggles and gloves on, work inside a cardboard box to catch flying shards, grip the metal base with needle-nose pliers and pull until it comes away, then break out the black glass with the pliers and snap the filament off with a screwdriver. Tweezers pull the debris. A funnel gets the sand in. Because there is no soil and no live moss, this wants partial light and one spritz from a spray bottle a week, and nothing else.
Get the full tutorial at Crafting a Green World.
8. Light Bulb Mini Planter
The same bulb, taken a different way: painted opaque rather than left clear, with small flowers dotted over the pink and a spray of grass out of the top. Painting the glass changes what the project is. A clear bulb is a terrarium and you look into it; a painted one is a pot and you only look at what grows out of it, which means you can skip the careful layering entirely. Spray or brush acrylic on the outside, not the inside, and key the surface first with a light scuff, because glass is glossy and paint lifts off it in sheets otherwise.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.
9. Easy 1 Hour DIY Terrarium
Five planters in under an hour and about twenty dollars all in, using thrifted glass rather than anything bought for the job. The layers run small rocks, then activated charcoal, then moss, then an inch or two of succulent soil, then the cuttings, with a scatter of moss or pebbles on top if you want to hide the soil line. Charcoal is the layer people skip and it is what stops a closed container going mouldy. Spritz once a week rather than pouring, keep them out of direct sun because it scorches the leaves, and when in doubt underwater: rot is what actually kills these.
Get the full tutorial at Saved By Love Creations.
10. Spice Jar Terrarium
Supermarket spice jars, rinsed and dried, rebuilt as sealed miniature terrariums. The layers run polished gravel, then dried moss, then a shallow bed of terrarium soil misted just damp, then the living moss pressed down on top with a bamboo skewer or a chopstick and a few pebbles scattered over. If you are working from dehydrated moss, soak it for about three hours before you start anything. Screw the lid back on and stand the jar somewhere shady with filtered light, then mist it every three or four weeks, more often in a hot dry room. Damp and never wet is the whole maintenance instruction.
Get the full tutorial at Red-Handled Scissors.
11. Wire Cloche Terrarium
A succulent garden in a plastic planter liner set on a round serving tray, with a chicken wire cloche made to fit over the top. The cloche is cut in two pieces: a cylinder sized to the liner’s diameter, and a cone made by cutting a circle out of the wire using a large clock face as a template, slicing to the centre and pulling it into a point. Leave little wire tabs when you cut, because those tabs are what hold every seam. Spray it oil rubbed bronze once the shape is set, then twist a finial on top with a spare wire or a twist tie.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Show Off.
12. Magnetic Terrariums
Open-faced metal tins turned into wall or fridge terrariums, with a clear plastic film front, white gravel, reindeer moss and an air plant inside each. The supply list on the photograph is the whole recipe: tins, plastic film, white gravel, reindeer moss, air plants and E6000 glue, and the sequence is trace and cut the film to the tin, fit and glue it, then fill. Mounting vertically is why the film matters, because the contents would fall straight out otherwise, and it is also why the planting has to be dry: gravel, preserved moss and an air plant, with nothing wet behind the glue line.
Get the full tutorial at Best DIY Projects.
13. Mason Jar Terrarium
Three mason jars planted in about half an inch of small rocks, then roughly an inch of potting mix, then a terrarium plant with the roots gently teased apart, then moss over the top. Those two numbers are the useful part, because half an inch of drainage under an inch of soil is a ratio that scales to almost any jar on this page. Moss from the garden works as well as bought. Then the decision: leave the jars open and water more often, or screw the caps on and water far less, which is the whole difference between an open and a closed terrarium.
Get the full tutorial at Jenna Burger.
14. Kids Terrarium
A fake terrarium built from preserved sheet moss over a styrofoam cube, with hand-painted toadstools and a small animal figure inside a jar. Nothing here is alive, which is the entire point for a child: no watering, no light, nothing to kill. The mushrooms are wooden pegs with the tops dipped in red paint and dotted white. The moss goes over the styrofoam rather than straight into the jar because sheet moss is flat and thin and will not build height on its own. Preserved moss stays green for years; swap it out after two or three. Keep it out of sunlight.
Get the full tutorial at All Things Heart and Home.
15. Herb Terrarium
A large clear plastic Christmas ornament with a circle cut out of one side, filled with potting soil and planted with mint pulled out through the hole, then hung on twine in a kitchen window. Cut the circle above the midline so there is depth below it to hold soil. Trace the outline first, either directly onto the plastic or with a craft punch on sticker paper stuck to the surface, then score around it with a craft knife several times before trying to cut through. The knife will slip at least once; the plant covers the scratch. Seeds work too if you are patient.
Get the full tutorial at Dukes and Duchesses.
16. Terrarium Necklace
A corked glass vial on a chain with a living plant inside, and the fiddly part is loading it. Stand the vial in a clothespin so it cannot roll, tip in about a quarter teaspoon of sand or fine gravel, then feed the soil down through a rolled paper tube. Tiny succulents or moss go in with tweezers. A succulent cutting wants its stem left to dry for several days first, or it carries too much moisture in with it. One drop of water, a cotton swab round the inside of the glass, then the cork in firmly. Keep it out of direct sun and pop the cork if the sides mist up.
Get the full tutorial at Inhabitat.
17. Freshwater Terrarium
A thrifted glass bowl on separately thrifted hairpin legs, filled with water and floating pond plants rather than soil, which makes it the only item on this page that is a pond rather than a terrarium. About six dollars bought the starter plants, and lettuce-type floaters multiply into new clusters on their own until they outgrow the bowl. A small goldfish net lifts out the debris and sediment that settles, and a proper clean out a few times a year keeps it clear. Two warnings from the maker: old glass bowls can contain lead, and surplus plants must never go into a natural waterway.
Get the full tutorial at Scrap and Salvage.
18. Teacup Terrarium
Blue and white teacups planted with succulents, moss and small creeping plants, done in about five minutes each and used as place settings on a brunch table. Watering is the part that surprises people: there is no drainage hole and no need for one, because these plants want very little water and the whole plant lifts straight out of the cup to be misted or watered and then goes back in. That one habit is what makes a cup with no hole workable at all. Small creeping and ground cover plants are the right shape, since a tall plant tips a shallow cup over.
Get the full tutorial at The Inspired Room.
19. Dollar Tree Farmhouse Terrarium
Eight picture frames from a dollar store, four at five by seven and four at eight by ten, glued into a glasshouse with a pitched roof for about eight dollars in materials. Take the plastic and the glass out of every frame first, paint all eight in one go and let them dry fully before any assembly, because painting a built box means chasing a brush into corners you cannot reach. Hot glue will hold it, though E6000 is the stronger option on a piece this size. It works as a terrarium, a centrepiece or just a lidded box for whatever wants displaying.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.
20. Dollar Tree Light Up Terrarium
A garden dish filled with white sand, seashells, stones, faux succulents and moss, with colour-changing tea lights and LED string lights buried in among them so the whole thing glows after dark. Burying the lights rather than draping them is what stops it looking like a bowl with fairy lights in it: push the tea lights down until only the diffused glow shows through the sand and let the string run underneath the moss. Everything in it is artificial, so there is no watering, no light requirement and nothing that objects to being sat next to a warm LED.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.
