How to Make a Picket Fence from Pallets

Building this picket fence from recycled pallets is my favorite project we’ve done so far in our new home. We got all the pallets for free on Craigslist, so for about $20 we were able to build this adorable little garden fence.

We had already built all the raised beds and wanted to make our veggie garden its own little world. Hubby took the pallets apart the old fashioned (and HARD) way with a sledgehammer. We recommend investing in a reciprocating saw if you’re planning on working with pallet wood! The pallet wood was the perfect size for our pickets.

We started out nailing each picket to two firring strips, using wooden spacers we cut to keep them uniformly spaced. Once we had all our pickets on each section we trimmed the bottom to make it straight, and we cut the corners off the tops and sanded them to get the cute dog ear shape.

After the section was finished I painted it this perfect lilac color which looks so cute and whimsical in the yard.  Some of the pickets were more receptive to the paint than others which contributed to the quaint, imperfect, rustic look.