Upcycling | 5 ways to reuse glass jars and bottles.

Feeling crafty? Here are a few ideas we’ve put together to help you make the most of your glass packaging! 

All of our packaging is recyclable, of course. But if you’d like to get a little more creative with your jars and bottles, we’ve got some spicy ideas for you and your home that we think you’ll love. 

Tealight holders

This is an absolute classic of course. Your empty glass jars make the perfect home for mood setting tealights. You can even pop in a bed of coloured sand for the tealight to sit upon for a little pzazz.

You might also want to create a decorative hanging basket for your new tealight holder, particularly if you’re using it outside. 

Bookends

Whether you’re a voracious reader or not, we all have a few books lying around. Prop them up with some home-made bookends to display your favourite reads without them sliding off the shelf and knocking your coffee all over the floor.

To do this, get some coloured sand – you can find this online or at your local craft store – and pour it into an empty, dry, glass jar or bottle. You can arrange the sand however you like, creating interesting patterns that’ll look magical.

Take a look at these sand art examples for some inspiration.

P.S. Don’t forget to put the lid on…

Message in a bottle 

Option 1.

Have you ever organised a treasure hunt? They can be great fun (that definitely doesn’t change with age) and your tiny bottles are the perfect size for mysterious miniature riddles. Make sure the inside of the bottle is clean and dry first, then pop your riddle in the bottle for your treasure hunters to find. 

To get you started, take a look at these ideas for riddles

Option 2.

If you’re feeling more romantic, why not step away from the world of cryptic pirates and include a message in a bottle as part of a gift for a loved one. It’s a novel way to make someone feel special. 

Personal Perfume Bottle

Did you know, you can design and create your very own perfume using essential oils? Carrying around a giant bottle of perfume is never ideal. Having something that you can transport easily is perfect and what’s more, personal to you. To apply, you can simply use one of our reusable oil droppers, dabbing a little onto your skin as required.

A signature perfume recipe basically consists of:

  • 80 drops of carrier oil. A carrier oil is an unscented oil base for your perfume, usually consisting of something like almond oil or jojoba oil. 
  • 20 drops of an essential oil blend. (10 drops base: 5 drops head: 5 drops heart). Never apply these essential oils to your skin without a carrier oil base, as they’re too strong for direct contact, and may cause irritation. 

So that’s 80% carrier oil, 20% essential oil blend. You can scale down the number of drops to match the size of your bottle. 

Important – If you have sensitive skin, it’s best to use a lower concentration of essential oils, to be on the safe side. We recommend no more than 15%.

For a step by step guide to making your own perfume, click here.

Mini plant pot

Your glass jars are perfect for simply propagating a plant, which consists of taking a cutting of your plant and leaving it in water, or for creating a miniature open air cactus terrarium! 

Here are the basic steps you can take to create your own mini cactus terrarium:

  1. As there are no holes in your glass jar for drainage, it’s important to add pumice stones as a base. 
  2. Next, add a layer of activated charcoal or lava rocks to prevent algae build up.
  3. Then use a well drained potting mix suitable for cacti as your soil base.
  4. Finally, take your mini cactus from its pot, loosen the roots slightly, and settle into the soil.

For full step by step instructions, watch this video.

Once you’re ready to go, you might want to add a little extra to your plant pot by creating a hanging basket for it to live in. Take a look at this short video for instructions on how to create your very own hanging plant pot. All you’ll need is a sturdy piece of rope.

You might also want to use this method to hang coloured sand art jars around your home!

Bonus suggestion

Use your tiny bottle as a tiny vase for little flowers! If you’ve ever looked longingly at a sylvanian families set, this one’s for you.

Have fun crafting! Let us know how you got on by sharing your creations with us over on Instagram @gruum_hq or Facebook @grüum.

Love, grüum

Keep reading…