How to Build a Trellis

When it comes to exterior decorations for your home, finding the right ones can be a difficult thing to balance. If you get too extravagant or excessive your home will appear gaudy and loud. Some nice accents your home can make a huge difference. Adding something simple like a trellis with climbing or flowering vines can add a lot of color and style without going overboard. Using things like ivy or jasmine can improve the look without making a spectacle of your home. Jasmine is one of my favorite vines since it adds a nice, subtle aroma and spreads itself out along the walls instead of completely covering it and blocking your home's exterior and natural beauty. With some minor trimming, there are several vines that can accomplish this, but they all need a form of support to cling to. This is where a nice trellis comes in handy. If you build it correctly, you can even shape the vines into patterns on your home. You can design the trellis to fit any wall or even curve it around to accent certain areas or force the vines to grow around windows and entryways. These are quite easy to construct and rather cheap to slap together.

As with all home improvement projects this one begins with the design phase. The first thing that you will need to do is figure out where you are going to put the trellis and what type of vine it needs to support. There are some vines that are a little heavier and you will need to use thicker wood while others are much lighter and can be held up by the thinnest of boards. You will also want to look at how much area this will cover. The more area, the more wood you will need to buy. The last thing that needs to be considered in the design is how dense you want the vine to be. If you want it to completely cover your wall, you will need to make the gaps in the trellis closer together and vice versa. When designing the trellis, draw the exterior lines first. Once you have that done, go back and draw lines at a 45 degree angle from the ground from edge to edge of your design. You will want to space these lines apart in the density that you want your trellis. Try to get as close to scale as possible. For instance, if you want a sparse covering and your scale is one foot to one inch, place the lines an inch and a half apart. Once you make the lines that angle left, go back and make the lines that angle right. After the lines have been drawn, count them. This is the number of boards that you will need to purchase. You will also need to buy a box or two of finishing nails to hold them together. If you do not have an angular saw, you can often ask the hardware store where you buy your lumber to cut the boards to order. This is either a free service or has a very nominal fee. You will also need the supports along the edge. This will consist of straight cut boards that run along each edge of your trellis to include the top and bottom. You will also need your paint or stain, some weatherproofing, sandpaper and a hammer.

Now that you have your supplies, it is time to get started. Before you get started, you will want to gently sand all the boards to a nice smooth finish. Once they are sanded, take a paper towel or old rag and wipe all the dust off. You can lightly moisten the towel or rag to aid in getting it all, or use a furniture polish. Once everything is wiped clean, you will now want to stain them or weatherproof them if you are using paint. You want to use a couple coats. Now add some clear coat to ensure they can handle the weather and the watering that you will be giving your vines. The next thing that you will want to do is lay out your trellis on the ground. Put all the boards in the right spots and piece it together before you nail it down. Once you have all the boards in position, you may want to glue the joints together. This will help with the stability of your trellis. If you do glue them together, you will want to let it dry overnight. Once the glue is dry, you can now nail them together to finalize your trellis. Place one finishing nail at every spot where the wood overlaps. Make sure the nail is centered in both boards when you drive it through. If it is off a little it can cause the wood to crack. If the nails extend past both boards, don't worry about it. You can use this to your own advantage. You can tack the extended portion of the nail directly to your home to help anchor it. If you do this though, the trellis will need to stay in place permanently. Otherwise, it will cause a bunch of holes in your home's exterior that you will have to patch up. If you do not want to use the extended portion of the nails, you can use your hammer to bend them over flush with the wood. If there is a lot of wet weather in your area, you may want to use a spackle, wood filler, or weatherproofing over each nail. This will help keep the water from seeping in the nail hole and causing damage.

Once everything is nailed together you can finally put the trellis up. To do this you will need to find several anchor points on your home's exterior. You only need to tack the border of the trellis to your actual home. You will need the border attached to studs in the wall. They will drive through the home's exterior into the support beams underneath. Depending on your exterior, you may want to use screws for this. When it comes to adobe, stucco or brick, screws tend to work better as nails cannot grip the material at all. All that is left is to plant your vines. You will want to remember that a trellis is not really meant to support weight. If you make it too strong, you are just giving trespassers another way to break into your home. You may also be giving your kids an easy way to sneak out.

This is all there is to creating a unique and simple addition to your home that will increase the beauty and tranquility of your home. A trellis can do more than just add a new look. With the added vines, you can save energy from your heating and cooling. These vines make a very nice natural insulation and will help trap the heat or provide shade to keep your home cool. There are many things that you can do with a trellis as well. The possibilities are truly endless with this simple and affordable addition to your home.