What was the most important feature of the last container that you purchased?

I voted 'price'.
I tend to buy pots at yard sales and get some great bargains that way. My favorite bargain this past season was this gorgeous, very large, handmade Italian terracotta pot, now planted with a beautiful variegated Ponytail palm. I paid $ 25 for it and it surely would retail for well over $ 100 in a store. The fact that it had already acquired a lovely patina was a bonus!!

I needed a container to pot up my willow salix in... one that won't break in the cold.. picked up a painted Styrofoam one

I don't garden in containers because of watering. Have plenty of beds to plant in.

We have room in the ground so don't use them. If I lived where there was very little space, I would use them.

I voted size, as it's surely the most important criterion. However, there's a missing category - appearance.

Good Idea for this thread!

I voted "size" but that is just part of the story.

I have a large city yard, plenty of room to plant in the ground-but, I love the look of huge pots anchoring all the beds. When I buy pots, it's quite an investment, since I like to use the same pot throughout the beds.
Sooo...I need big, I need weather resistant, I need old-world looking, and I need reasonably priced.haha. Oh! And I also have to be able to load, unload, and MOVE those pots-by myself, since my DH is unable to help.

My biggest disaster with pots falling apart, literally layer by layer- was with pots that I bought from Sam's club. What a horrid mess, and a few hundred dollars down the tube.

Sashagirl

Purpose. They are on wheels, have water spouts sticking up for easy watering, covers and size.

My pots tend to be indoors and themain reason I buy one is to size up.

I voted for Size, according to my plant needs, but the next thing would be Material, because I usually prefer Clay pots, although sometimes heavy plastic works well for those plants that dry out faster.

I'm always on the lookout for the largest containers I can get, and even then my plants get so large that I become really nervous when the wind picks up. I'm sure some of my plants plus container can weigh up to hundreds of pounds, so I'd rather not have them blown over in a storm!

Lightweight is most important but it has to coincide with the right size.

My most recent purchase was self-watering pots for my back deck. Faces west with southern exposure as well. I also went with plastic over clay (my usual preference) for weight. Not sure about that yet, but the self-watering works well.

I voted 'purpose'. My yard is about the size of a basketball court so I don't have the room to have a lot of in-ground stuff. Also, after my experience last year I think I'll be able to battle diseases and bugs more easily with the plants up out of the ground. I am currently in negotiations with my wife for more area of our small yard for gardening and will do some in-ground stuff. I might just unilaterally annex some ground when she's not looking and then play stupid as though I thought it was what we agreed upon. I'll let you know how it works. She loves grass, I love veggies. It's a real US/USSR environment around here when I go to set my garden up. It's all fun though.

I picked 'Purpose' I needed a large and stylish container for one of my Brugs.

I picked size. I have an elephant ear bulb that I need to pot up and the pot has to be big enough. I also have some citrus that I need to repot. Tina

Being on limited income, I vote for anything I can salvage and get for free.

I voted for purpose. This year, I decided to give earth boxes a try. I just received 2 of them & am anticipating growing tomatoes in them. My previous attempts at tomatoes in the ground resulted in all sorts of diseases. In containers, I've always forgotten to water them. I hope these earth boxes work out well for me.

I plant tomatoes in tires and have always had good luck with them. Also zucchini.

Voted size, because size does matter when it comes to containers! lol

I have, at the moment one 24" (so far), some 20", some 16" and 14" and 12" ones. I prefer the larger size containers though and I'm trying to replace the smaller ones with larger size ones every year.

I grow plants in the ground and in containers. I grow alot of plants to attract the Hummingbirds and Butterflies. Some of the plants attract birds and the many different bees too.

I have containers on the front porch, at the end of our side entry driveway, on the patio and in the backyard surrounded by a couple of Lilacs. One year, I also had containers all along our front steps.

Here's a photo taken last Summer on my front porch of 3 containers of Fuchsia 'Gartenmeister Bonstedt' along with a container of Coleus which I plant every year. I always have Fuchsia 'Gartenmeister' on the front porch for the Hummers every year! I'm thinking about larger container for the porch next year.


This message was edited Feb 15, 2010 5:10 PM

Here's some of my containers in Summer 2008. These are on the patio in the backyard.

Some of the patio containers in Summer 2008.

I voted purpose. I needed a pot for an ornamental grass by the garage. It needed to be light, colorful and big enough to hold the grass and cover the gutter downspout.

This message was edited Feb 15, 2010 3:25 PM

Another photo of Summer 2008 patio containers.

I voted "purpose" -- wanted flower boxes to hang on my deck railing and bought self-watering ones from Gardener's Supply several years ago. They have worked great for me, the deck is on the south side of the house and I could never keep plants watered enough there before.

These are just some of the containers I had during Summer 2007 which were all along our front steps.

4 of the containers I had on the patio during Summer 2007.

No outside faucets - needed watering cans, bought two at Lows ( cannot remember the price but they served the purpose ).

The last one I bought was/is just too cool. It is a half pot to hang on a wall and is black with a womans face.
I voted price because if it had been to expensive, I wouldn't have bought it and, as Patgeorge said, there wasn't an "appearance" option.
I'll try to get a pic of the container tomorrow and post it.
Barb

I purchased containers last Fall for ...main reason; to prevent root rot! We've been getting so much rain, the flower bed never did dry out enough to plant springbulbs. So I purchased large, durable containers for spring bulbs this year.

I voted size, but that should be "size and shape". I will buy a fancy/expensive decorative container if I see one on sale I like. Then I need at least one utilitarian container to fit inside it. So I go shopping with a tape measure to get the perfect "liner" pot.

I don't use containers, I prefer the ground.

I leave most of the container items for the deck to my DH, and he does a great job. I have around 23 huge flower beds to tend, and containers take too much watering in our summers. I love my sprinkler system.

I voted purpose, but cost enters into my choice also. Most of my pots are on my east facing deck, and since I live in desert part of WA, I installed an automatic on timer watering system, which has worked quite well. I planted tomatoes in large 20" pots, one on each side of garage door, facing east. They had to be hand watered, but produced lots of tomatoes.

Donna

Donna - I also have a barrel on each side of the garage for just cherry tomatoes (Sweet 100) so, even if it's raining, I can pick off enough for dinner and not get drenched. My basil is in with them.

Pirl, did you plant the basil in the same pot or in seperate pots around the large pots. I guess planting in same pot would be good since basil likes heat and it is hot where the pots are. I planted Chocolate Cherry last year in one of the pots. It was good. Donna

Ours are big square wooden planters that my husband built and there's plenty of room for herbs so one box has thyme and the other has basil. I added hyacinths to each for my own pleasure but have to keep mesh on each box to keep the horrid deer away from both the hyacinths and the tomatoes. The crows would dive bomb the tomatoes as well if they weren't covered.

Here the spinach is near the end of production and the almost invisible tomato is planted deeply in the center. The basil gets planted in June.

Pirl - nice multi-task planting. Perhaps I'll do that with my little tomato patch this year. I usually underplant with marigolds, and could actually still do that after the spinach.

I don't garden in containers cuz I HATE to water!!! Same reason most of my houseplants are dead/dieing!