21 ways to recycle an empty laundry bottle

21 ways to recycle an empty laundry bottle

Take one empty laundry bottle and make a watering can, a vase, a scoop, a truck and more! There are so many possibilities, you will never throw out an empty laundry bottle again!

Laundry bottles are one of the all-time great designs for recycled goodness. They are generally large with a comfortable handle, wide at the mouth, made of soft, recyclable plastic and they smell nice.

Find out all the wonderful things you can do with an empty detergent bottle and I'll bet you can come up with a good way to use that clean, fresh fragrance for something!

1. Make a vase

What could be easier than removing the labels, cutting off the top of the bottle, giving the base a good clean and arranging some beautiful flowers inside? The bottle is the perfect vase because it's translucent without being see-through. You get a lovely flow of light without being able to see all the mixed up stems inside the vase. You can cut your bottle to a size that best suits your arrangement.

2. Make a funnel

Cut off the base of the bottle and use the top as a handy funnel. The top of the funnel is a generous size so if you've got pets, this will be a really useful tool for getting food out of those huge pet food bags into the dog bowl.

3. Set up a drip-irrigation system

If you're going away and need to keep your garden watered, make tiny holes in the base of your bottle, fill it with water and set it next to your plants. Water will gently drip away while you're gone, keeping the plant hydrated and happy.

4. Water your plants

Pierce small holes in the lid of your bottle, fill it with water, put the lid back on and water the plants. Great for small kids, you can make a few watering cans to fill up and keep them happy for ages.

5. Make a lampshade

Take inspiration from lighting designer Steven Wine and create something unique and amazing. A translucent bottle is perfect for making a lamp as the light bulb inside becomes beautifully diffused.  Click here to see some of his creative laundry bottle work.

6. Make a bath toy

Bottles are great fun in the bath. You can make an empty laundry bottle even more fun by piercing holes in the lid. Your toddler can fill the bottle with water, put the lid on and sprinkle the water or take the lid off and pour away to their heart's content.

7. Make a toy car

Use the bottle, the cap, paint and your imagination to create a whole car park full of laundry bottle cars. Find all the inspiration you need here at Make:.

8. Light up your pool

Pop a couple of glow sticks inside a translucent laundry bottle and float them on the pool at your next party. It looks colourful, lovely and very, very inviting.

9. Turn it into a scoop

Use your bottle top as a scoop for pet food, kitty litter, soil, sand or anything outdoorsy. Cut straight across and use the top of the bottle with the handle as your scoop. Or cut down through the front of the bottle on a diagonal and use the whole bottle as a giant scoop.

10. Use it as a leaf rake

Make your scoop, as above, and pierce holes in the top of the bottle. It's great for scooping leaves out of the pool as the water will drain through, leaving the leaves in the scoop. You can also use your scoop to collect leaves out of the gutter.

11. Make jewellery

If your bottle is made from PET plastic, you can cut it up to make pretty cool jewellery. Cut the bottle into pieces, decorate with permanent markers, bake in a moderately hot oven and you've got yourself an original! I think we used to call this technique 'shrinky dinks' back in the day.  Visit Picklebums for the full tutorial.

12. Make a ball catcher game

Take two empty laundry bottles, cut the bases off, decorate the tops with paint, tape or permanent markers and use them to catch a ball! Toss the ball back and forth using the ball catchers and the first one to miss, awards one point to the other person. The first person to reach 20 points is the winner.

Make it harder by increasing the distance between the players. You could also attach the ball to the handle using string to make this a one person game. The object is to throw the ball up in the air and catch it in the scoop.

13. Make beach buckets and scoops

Cut the base off your bottle to be the bucket and use the top as your scoop. It's the perfect beach toy to take on holidays, because you can put it in the recycling at the end of the trip without having to deal with bringing sand home in your luggage.

14. Dry your dish tools

Cut the bottom off your container, add small holes and use it to drain your dish tools after you've cleaned the kitchen.

15. Get organised

Cut a scoop out of the plain (not handled) side of the bottle and use it for storage. You can fill the bottle with all kinds of things and tuck it onto a shelf. The handle makes accessing it easy. You can see how this works over on Family Handyman.

16 Reuse them to house other liquids

Buy things like vinegar, dish washing liquid, dishwasher detergent and cleaning liquids in bulk and rehouse them in a matching set of laundry bottles. It's practical and it looks good!

17. Lift them to get fit

Fill two empty laundry bottles with water and use them as free weights. As you get stronger you can change the water for sand and then gravel!

18. Make a pencil holder

The kids can never have enough space for all the pencils, textas, crayons and pens they collect. Make access easy by cutting off the bottom of a laundry bottle and storing the pencils inside.

The kids can decorate with permanent markers or washi tape. You can use this little tub to store anything you like - great for storing packets in the pantry, small toys, keeping books neat beside your bed - the possibilities are endless.

19. Use them as sandbags

Fill with sand or water and weigh down tent pegs, basketball hoops, tarps and anything else you'd usually use a sandbag to keep in place.

20. Get rid of snails and slugs

Cut the top off your bottle, bury in the ground around your veggies until only the tip of the rim is showing. Fill with snail bait like beer and wait for the critters to come.

21. Make a hey-big-spender piggy bank

If you've got genuine savers on your hands, they're going to need a bigger bank. Adapt this cute piggy piggy bank tutorial by simply using an empty detergent bottle instead of a drink bottle. Happy saving!