DIY Outdoor Porch Ideas

The perfect porch can become the entertaining space of your dreams, but do you know what you need to make that dream come true? The Hometalk community has all of the hacks you need to get you started and inspire you to build your own porch. Join the conversation on our dicussion boards or take a moment to watch a video. Be inspired!

Terra Cotta Pot Lighthouse With Solar Light

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Design Ideas for Porches

Pick a color theme: Choose a color theme of two or three colors only. Using only these colors allows your porch to utilize color without looking tacky.
Go vintage and antique: Decorate your porch using antique items and anything vintage. Create a feeling of nostalgia as guests enter your home.
Create a hangout spot: Turn your porch into a cozy place to meet and greet by adding chairs, potted plants, and lights for evening meetups.
Choose bright colors: Make a confident and lasting impression by using bright colors to decorate and paint your porch.
Build a modern porch: Design a modern porch by using materials such as brick or stone. Keep your colors neutral and your design minimal and simple.

More Outdoor Ideas

Top DIY Porch Projects

Are you searching for the top DIY outdoor porch ideas? Make yourself at home.

Terra Cotta Pot Lighthouse With Solar Light

I had seen clay pot solar lighthouses on many DIY sites and I decided to give it a shot myself.

Diane S

How to Make a Nautical Mason Jar Lamp in 6 Easy Steps

Add a bit of coastal style to your porch design with this DIY mason jar lamp made from affordable Dollar Store items. In no time at all, you’ll have one-of-a-kind outdoor light fixtures that bring a warm, inviting glow to your space.This post was transcribed by a member of the Hometalk editorial team from the original HometalkTV episode.

Meredith - Arts & Classy

How to Turn Plastic Planters Into a Beautiful DIY Urn Planter

Looking for a budget-friendly way to upgrade your porch? Learn how to turn plastic plant pots into a beautiful DIY urn planter with this easy tutorial!You can create a gorgeous stone-textured urn that will add charm and elegance to your home's exterior.This post was transcribed by a member of the Hometalk editorial team from the original HometalkTV episode.

Mitch Couch

Updating Front Entrance With Flagstone

My neighbor, who is a true artisan stonemason from Portugal, offered to update my front entrance with flagstone. Since he and his wife moved next door to me, he has transformed his home into a one of a kind beauty that includes a stone patio, fountain, walkway, and beautiful landscaping with a stacked stone wall. So naturally I jumped at the offer since I had been concerned about a crack around my steps getting bigger (the builder said they wouldn't fix small cracks such as this) as the house continues to settle.

Gail@Purple Hues and Me

DIY Patio and Garden Bench and Chair

When I was ready to start furnishing the patio space I had trouble finding furniture that was the size I wanted. I was looking for a bench that would fit perfectly against my back wall and decided that in order to find just the right size to maximize my space, I would have to build it. My DIY patio bench was so incredibly simple to build, adds so much enjoyable living space to my home, and looks amazing! One of the best parts of the building project was that I was able to make use of the leftover cut boards to build a matching chair.

DIYfixman

A Beautiful Brick Porch in One Weekend

I stenciled my front porch to make it look like brick and I love it! It took one weekend and it was totally worth it!(for the in-depth tutorial please visit my blog www.somethingpaintedwhite.com)

Cindy | Something Painted White

Staining a concrete walkway

A huge change in less than 4 hours! Curb appeal + Thank you HDTV for the idea :)

Joy2Journey

How To Fix Broken Canvas On A Porch Swing

I've recently been brainstorming on how to fix broken canvas on a porch swing. We've had this porch swing for 8 years now. It was something I begged my husband for right after my oldest daughter was born. I wanted something to sit in and rock my newborn while I enjoyed the summer weather. My husband brought home this one at a great price from Bargain Outlet.After 7 years of sun rays beating down on it, the canvas had had enough, and the material finally split.

Maura White

My Bohemian Balcony Makeover: Built a Mini Deck, Stained & Stenciled..

Hello again from sunny Malaysia :) Just wanna say a big thank you to all who have visited and liked and commented on my 2 previous projects!! :)This is to be my 3rd makeover of the year! And this time, I have chosen to do an outdoor space. Living on the 8th floor, our only outdoor space within the apartment would be the balcony. We have a relatively small balcony, probably about 12 feet x 5 feet give and take. It's a space that I seldom use because there was nothing there. Well we had a table and some plants but that was it ... a neglected space (for me at least). The husband likes to use it in the night when it's cooler outside. It is his go to space to write. It's a really lovely space if I think about it, because we get to watch the most beautiful sunsets during the evenings from this balcony. Don't know why I didn't give it more attention earlier. Anyways, it's time to do it up and give the family a hangout space, watch the sunset and give my husband a nice little nook to write surrounded by beauty instead of dying plants ((O_O))SO here is the Before and After photo of our balcony, and after that I will give you a brief description on the whole makeover process and what projects I did to enhance this outdoor space.*you can see the full process in the video link at the end of this article.

Winnie Luthien Thye

An Affordable Porch Makeover

The front stoop is a place where you welcome and greet guests. Ours was in need to some major TLC and didn't send off the welcoming vibe that we wanted!

Bright Green Door

Terra Cotta Pot Lighthouse With Solar Light

I had seen clay pot solar lighthouses on many DIY sites and I decided to give it a shot myself.

Diane S

How to Make a Nautical Mason Jar Lamp in 6 Easy Steps

Meredith - Arts & Classy

How to Turn Plastic Planters Into a Beautiful DIY Urn Planter

Mitch Couch

Updating Front Entrance With Flagstone

Gail@Purple Hues and Me

DIY Patio and Garden Bench and Chair

DIYfixman

A Beautiful Brick Porch in One Weekend

I stenciled my front porch to make it look like brick and I love it! It took one weekend and it was totally worth it!(for the in-depth tutorial please visit my blog www.somethingpaintedwhite.com)

Cindy | Something Painted White

Staining a concrete walkway

A huge change in less than 4 hours! Curb appeal + Thank you HDTV for the idea :)

Joy2Journey

How To Fix Broken Canvas On A Porch Swing

Maura White

My Bohemian Balcony Makeover: Built a Mini Deck, Stained & Stenciled..

Winnie Luthien Thye

An Affordable Porch Makeover

The front stoop is a place where you welcome and greet guests. Ours was in need to some major TLC and didn't send off the welcoming vibe that we wanted!

Bright Green Door

Slideshows of outdoor porch projects that will take your breath away. Take notes!

Outdoor Porch Videos

DIY outdoor porch video tutorials to inspire you. Don't forget to take notes.

The Perfect Small Balcony Makeover in 10 Simple Steps

Like millions of Indian city-dwellers, my apartment comes with a teeny-tiny balcony. For most people, this small space tends to be forgotten, only used on rare occasions. However, I'm a firm believer that every single inch of someone's home has the potential to be put to good use. No matter where you live in the world, it's likely that you also have a balcony that you think is too small to be a meaningful addition to your living space. However, this is not the case.

Venus Rose

Make a Rolling Gate for Your Porch

Do you have small children who use your porch as a play space? Or a pet that enjoys playing and napping on the porch? You can easily make a rolling gate from a short section of porch railings. The gate will help to keep your pet and your children more secure on your porch. Of course, nothing takes the place of parental supervision. Here's how: - Attach two casters at the bottom of a section of balustrade - Attach the "rolling"balustrade with hinges - Close with a latch or even a bungee cord See a video below that demonstrates this easy fix!

Front Porch Ideas

Teeny Tiny Balcony Makeover On a Budget

I have this little tiny balcony that had water damage on the walls and just overall dinginess, and I was looking for low cost ways to make it a nice place to sit and read. I had no experience with tiling before and I'm really happy with the result!

Tova Pearl

Hometalkers' Favorite DIY Outdoor Porch Projects

We've gathered the best DIY outdoor porch projects right here for you.

Updating Your Skinny Porch Columns

If you love this project, grab your quick start DIY guide & subscribe to our blog!*Thank you to DAP Products for sponsoring this project*Looking to add curb appeal to your house? Give your skinny porch posts a makeover! This tutorial will show you how to beef up your boring porch posts and add column covers for some major curb appeal!

Chelsea @ Making Manzanita

Faux Brick Walkway

I saw article this in one of my Dad's Handyman Magazine Issues many years ago, tore it out, saved it and have wanted to do it ever since. It was a great way to tie in the sidewalk with my salvaged brick edging and makeshift "sitting area" under the Arbor.

Debbie/Dragonfly Treasure

Update Those Boring Posts Outside Your Home!

A few weeks ago I posted on Hometalk how I added curb appeal to our brick on the outside of our home: http://www.hometalk.com/diy/paint/exteriors/add-curb-appeal-with-german-mortar-smear--23890303 and I will say this, I get excited every time I pull into the driveway and I feel proud of the change I made to our home.

Elizabeth Fencl

Outdoor Curtain Rods for Aluminum Screen Room

I didn't want to use metal screws to attach any kind of curtain rod hardware to my aluminum uprights in my screen room. If you've ever priced "outdoor" tension curtain rods (glorified shower curtain rods) you know they are very expensive starting at @$40 and up. I needed 5 of them.

Becky Millard

Repairing Cracks in Concrete: 7 Minutes is All You Need

Doing fall preventive maintenance should include taking care of all the small or large cracks in your concrete driveway, steps, or walkways. I recently did a small project that as you'll discover is pretty darn easy and can stop cracks from turning into bigger headaches. If you have small horizontal cracks you can use concrete filler to seal them tight. Larger cracks should use polyfoam tubing as a filler then concrete filler on top-kinda like adding ketchup to a hot dog :). Click on this link because I think you'll benefit from the tips as well as my headless home repair tutor video (hey, it's tough producing these short movies by yourself and plus, we're getting close to Halloween anyway) http://www.homerepairtutor.com/repairing-cracks-in-concrete/

Home Repair Tutor

Painted Concrete Porch With a Stone Stencil

I pressure washed my porch many times but could not get all the stains out/off, so I decided to paint it and use the stone stencil to give it a stone look finish with more colors. First I painted the whole thing with one color so that it would look like a mortar or grout when I used the stencil with the other colors. I used 3 other colors in each of the blocks of the stencil and used a brush to scrub them into the concert which made each one come out a different look or color of stones. It made the porch a little cozier while sitting out in my swing. I spend more time on the porch now, in my swing.