Go according to the color of your chiminea. If it is black you can plant anything. If it is terra cotta and you wanted flowers, I would put yellow, orange, white, green and colors that match the earth/orange. That is from an eye appeal perspective. Other totally knowledgeable ladies on this forum could comment with greater expertise on actual plant material names.

Weave~

Do you want to plant in the base of the chiminea or in the smoke stack or both? I'm thinking that you might either want to fill the stack with other material and just potting soil for about the top 12" or put a pot in the top...that would be a lot of soil. The plants you use should be heat tolerant as the heating of the metal will increase the amount of heat to your plants...unless you choose to put it in the shade. Let us see a picture!!

weave...if it's iron and has an open view all the way around it (like mine), then you could use container plantings of your choice....I would choose a re-cycled type of container.

If it's terra cotta and just has a front view, then I would choose a a big "Boston Fern" with some yellow viola plants mixed in.

If you want perennials to leave out all year in Zone 5 (that's me, too, 4 or 5), then all I know is that the perennials you choose for containers need to be hardy to Zone 3.

susieroses & marlene...great ideas! Good luck, weave & please share pic of finished GJ! Jeanne S.

I have a chiminea I have never used. It is made of terra cota and would be a great planter. I never thought about doing that. Cannot wait to see what ideas you guys have for planting. I will take a picture of mine tomorrow and see what suggestions are out there.

There is the bottom half of my chiminea under this staghorn fern.It got blown over in a storm a couple years ago and the top half broke.
Kathi

{{gwi:154621}}

Uh, ok we will have to take your word on that, as that lovely staghorn fern is huge and it could be in a coffee can for all we know..lol

well done

great idea. never thought of doing that. definitely going to do that with my chiminea in the winter time when i dont use it outside or in my backyard patio. people can also do that with a fire pit i guess. if you dont already have a chiminea, you should get one. they are so much fun in the beginning and end of summer. I got mine with free shipping too at www.fireforless.com. Check it out of ur not a chiminea owner already.

Here is a link that might be useful: fireforless