Turn Scrap Wood Pallets Into An Outdoor Yard Feature That Boosts Curb Appeal

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Do you have a pile of scrap wood pallets stored in your garage or behind your shed? While there are tons of affordable backyard DIYs to reuse those old wooden pallets, there's a really clever and quite stunning yard feature that can easily boost your curb appeal: wooden walkways. You'll find lots of different ways clever homeowners have applied this project on social media, so you can easily put your own spin on it by taking a few ideas and putting them together. Then, get going on taking those pieces of pallet wood and laying down a gorgeous, rustic-looking boardwalk.

Laying the path isn't that difficult once you have the area relatively level. Because you're using planks of wood, you'll find them a bit more forgiving once they're laid down. You can lay the pallet wood directly in the dirt, but putting down a base layer of pea gravel helps support the wood and could make the walkway last longer. You'll be anchoring the pieces to the ground using landscape spikes, like these Cobaryen 8-inch nylon anchoring spikes, which you could also buy from your local hardware store.

The hardest part of the job you'll face is pulling the wooden pallets apart. For this, you'll need a circular saw, a reciprocating saw, a crowbar, and a hammer. You'll use the circular saw to cut the planks down each side to remove them from the side supports and the reciprocating saw with a metal blade to cut through the nails holding the boards down on the center support. You may need to use the crowbar and hammer to loosen the planks a little, so you can get the saw in to cut through the nails.

Once you have all your planks removed, it's a good idea to predrill the holes on either end for the edging spikes to go through. Doing this before you lay the planks down on the ground is going to save you a lot of bending over. At this point, you can also decide if you want to paint or stain the boards or just leave them as is. You might even choose to paint some of them and leave the remainder looking aged. Just remember to use a paint or stain that's designed for outdoor use and can handle foot traffic. You may also want to sand the boards first if they're particularly rough.

As soon as you've prepped your planks of pallet wood, it's time to start laying them down on the ground. Now, you have a few choices here. You can either lay them close to each other or space them apart. If you're going to space them out, you'll need something, like gravel, to fill the gaps in between. Your filler choice depends largely on what type of aesthetic you're after. 

For a front yard area and to boost curb appeal, laying the wood pieces close together creates a pleasant and somewhat whimsical boardwalk. However, if you're making a long walkway and have a limited amount of wood, or you want to create a simple backyard boardwalk to protect shoes and feet from muddy grass, you might be better off spacing them apart and filling in the gaps with an attractive filler after the planks have been secured.

When the boards have been laid down on the ground in such a way that pleases you, it's time to grab the spikes and secure them. You'll want one spike on each end of every board, and you'll need to hammer the spikes down into the ground. If you're using a filler between spaced-out planks, add it to the project at this point. You might also walk to plant along your new pathway to soften the edges and increase curb appeal even more.

While you're completing this project, you might be a little concerned about whether the boards will last or if they're going to rot. Depending on the pallets that you acquired, you might well be surprised as to how sturdy the wood actually will be and how much weather exposure it can take. If you want the pallet wood to last even longer, putting down a gravel base can help by keeping the wood out of the dirt. At the end of the day, it's a fun project that looks fantastic, and if you find that some of the boards do start to deteriorate, you can replace them with new ones. Finally, if you have any left over wood, you could create a stunning garden wall using those affordable wood pallets. Incorporating the pallet wood in two places helps tie the look together.