5 gallon bucket ideas

5-Gallon Bucket Ideas – 19 Fresh Hacks You’ll Love

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Are you looking for 5-gallon bucket ideas? You are in the right place. Behold, 19 different ways to reuse the ol’ renovation project standby – an empty bucket!

If you enjoy taping, you’ll probably acquire quite a stack of stuck-together spackle pots.

After you wrestle your plastic buckets apart, put them to use in your garden, your next DIY, and even under your Christmas tree!

Let’s start brainstorming!

Planter Buckets

Cheers to our neighbors who created a bucket garden!

5 gallon bucket garden
planters galore!

Or make them even fancier with this DIY from Practical Whimsy Designs.  

You can even create a DIY garden stand for all your 5-gallon planters!  Snag the .pdf how-to on Etsy.

6 garden stand on etsy
photo courtesy of MannPlans on Etsy

Cleaning Bucket

Does a concentrated solution need some water?  Mixing an at-home floor cleaner?  Clean out a compound bucket and mop it up, baby!

Trash Bin

Line it with a contractor bag and never search for the trash on your job site again.  

5 gallon bucket

Paint Mixing Bucket

Are you mixing a specific color “just so”?  Use your compound bucket to make it happen!  

Concrete Mixing Bucket

This is especially advantageous if you never want to see the bucket again.  Concrete gets messy – don’t spend extra money on a place to mix it!  We used an old compound bucket on our Basement Bathroom Renovation to mix our self-leveling concrete.  Highly recommend!  

compound bucket hacks
let’s get ready to rummmmmbbbbbbllllle!!!!
From our Basement Bathroom Remodel

Savings Bank 

Here’s an idea for a five-gallon bucket DIY project. Cut a coin slot in a plastic lid to create a giant piggy bank!

Pile your nickels and dimes in one of these bad boys to amass your small fortune. You’ll need a wheelbarrow to move it, but hey, it’s yours!  

You get extra points for attaching a lid that’s difficult to remove, which includes all compound bucket lids in history.  

Rain Barrel

In the lovely land where we are even taxed on rain (I wish I was kidding!), we often leave buckets outside when a storm is en route.  

Why pay the water collector for something nature provides for free?  You could even take this further and make an official rain barrel.  

Kids Toy Storage

Tripping over Junior’s toys?  Give him a place to put them.  

Or, get yourself an official sports bucket like this:

sports bucket
photo courtesy of PersonalizationMail on Etsy

Fishing Gear Tote + Cushion

No extra buckets lying around?  Invest in this awesome setup to go fishing.  

5-gallon-bucket-fishing
photo courtesy of Imint2 on Etsy

Tool Bucket Tote

Stop wasting time looking for stuff — get your tools organized with this snazzy sleeve!  

Small Stool

Turn it upside down and create for yourselves a teddy bear’s picnic. 

5 gallon bucket hacks
brought to you by one of our epic coffee breaks

Need more comfort for your cartoush? Invest in a lid seat.

Camping Toilet

Consider it a tote-able toilet.

All you need to add is this seat

Compost Bin

Check out this DIY from Mama on the Homestead to create a small 5 gallon compost container.  Collect food scraps, make compost tea, and more with this practical garden DIY.

Patio Table

With a little creativity and a little more bling, a Hometalk contributor made this side patio table for almost nothing!

Clever Christmas Wrapping

Go all-in on a compound bucket theme this yuletide!

We once received a Christmas compound bucket stuffed with a bottle of wine and a home improvement store gift card.  It was a perfect gift for us during our Open Concept Galley Kitchen Renovation.

Boiler Drain Bucket

Houses aren’t all glam – sometimes you need to drain a spout.  The compound bucket is great for dirty work!

5 gallon bucket water

Garden Helper

Oh, the myriad of 5-gallon bucket ideas for the garden!  

Carry it around to collect weeds before dumping into your waste bag.  Or, tote along fertilizer or water.  Use a clean one for harvest season.

The possibilities are endless!

Ice Bucket

Tossing back a few cold ones?  Fill your compound bucket with ice and adult beverages.  Bottoms up!

Drum Set

Any New Yorker can tell you that a compound bucket makes for a perfect percussion instrument!  Just take the uptown A train on any given Tuesday, and you’ll hear them.  

Don’t forget to drop a dime in the tip bucket!

Final Thoughts on 5 Gallon Bucket Ideas

All hail the 5-gallon bucket!  Whether for planters, presents, or piggy banks, we hope you look at that stack of 5-gallon buckets with a new creative lens.  

What are your best 5 gallon bucket ideas?


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