Telephone Poles Repurposed

We live in Birmingham, Michigan in a part of town not typically known for its sprawling grounds. When we built the house, we knew we'd want some outdoor living space, but wanted to keep it as private as we could given the lay of the land. What we came up with was a pergola. And, to give it a little character, we decided to utilize old telephone poles as the support structures.

To anchor the poles, we fabricated tumbled paver bases, filled them up with concrete and then topped them off with some river rock.


We ended up planting a couple varieties of grapes and within a couple of years, we have the perfect canopy for the space. However, we have yet to have fresh dolmathes from my Greek wife.


We used a combination of 2x8's, 2x12's and 2x2's to tie all of the telephone poles together. It really makes for such a perfect hang out spot. As a matter a fact, I wrote this entire post, beer in hand, out here on the patio. Summer living.