If you have been following my Oh My Dog! series, you will remember the small patch of lawn I placed outside of our apartment door, so my puppy could have a good place to pee even during the fierce rainstorm we get in Mexico City regularly this time of the year. The obvious drawback is that there is not even a little bit of sunlight in that hallway, so it's just a matter of time before that grass dies, turning into a urine-soaked mess.

As a solution I decided to keep the entire roll of a square meter, which the lawn is sold in, so I could have four times my usual patch, and then rotate them. In other words, I needed a base structure for the three patches I was not using, so they could benefit from the sun and the rain on the roof. Not an incredibly demanding construction, by any means. In fact, I could possibly even make it so minimalistic that it would merit a post in The MINIMALIST community. (I hope the community agrees too - let me know!)

Crates from the Market

Finding material is not a big challenge. Every market is overflowing with wooden crates, and even though they are typically tossed out at the end of the day, if you come and ask for one they suddenly cost 20 pesos. That's about one USD, so it's not a big deal anyway. I got three of them. Needless to say, they are made of the cheapest and shoddiest kind of wood, essentially garbage even before tacked together into their current shapes. Disposable for sure, but fortunately also nicely recyclable and most importantly, modular in the sense that you can break them down into its pieces quite easily.

Finally I ended up with a bunch of longer and thinner pieces, some thicker shorter ones, and a few prism shaped corner pieces, plus a large pile of nails. Not every piece survived the deconstruction in one piece, but that doesn't mean that they can't be made useful. After all, the idea is to rearrange the crates into a lower but wider and longer shape. And yes, there were enough of its original nails still in usable condition to keep the new form together.

Making a Castle out of Manure

There is saying in Hungarian, that you can't build a castle out of excrement. This is quite ironic, since there have been many fine castles (and other buildings) constructed, using dung as part of the adobe parts at least. However, the idea it tries to convey, is that if you want a decent result, you need to use quality material. Sure, this argument has its place. But for my intended purpose this soft and brittle wood will be just fine... as long as I use enough of it!

I started out by making four rectangles of the right size. And sure enough, at first the seemed to fall apart just by looking at them. So I added a bit of reinforcement here, some bracing there, pounded in another nail where it seemed to be needed, then did all of that on the other side too. After a while the whole structure took on some stability. And then a bit more.

Getting Skilled Help

As I was hammering away, Bandido could not help but being interested in what I was doing. He would occasionally snatch some pieces (of course the ones I had just cut to size, and correctly placed for nailing) and run to another part of the roof where he could chew on it. This slowed down the construction process, but added a bit of fun distraction for both of us. Eventually, when the structure was somewhat stable, I actually welcomed the dog as a test subject. After all, it would be his weight (plus the grass) my base was supposed to hold, so having him jump around on it was the least I should subject the structure to.

Final Touches

In the end I was quite satisfied with my work. Having it properly aligned, or sanding it down to make it smooth? Who cares about that?! I never even got out a tape measure when cutting the pieces, relying only on my hands and fingers for sizing. The one thing I thought would be useful, is to give it a couple of generous coats of linseed oil. That way it may stay together for a few months maybe, which is all I'm expecting. Then I got the roll of grass, cut it up into four equal sizes, and laid them out on wire mesh. This would keep the lawn above ground, and make it easy to move back and forth. Perfect!

One piece I placed into the tray outside our door, the other three found a home in one corner of the roof. Here the grass could take up all the sun and rain it needs, while the last quarter could be peed on in the dark. Every week I would exchange that piece with one from above, so that it would have three weeks to recover. During that time the urine would also get washed away... At least that's my theory.

Utilizing Every Last Piece ... Almost

One thing I particularly enjoy, which should also fit this community quite well, I believe, is making use of as many of the original pieces as possible. Clearly, some boards are mostly bark, or so worm eaten that I rejected them right away. Others literally just fell apart as I touched them. But in the end it was only this small pile that remained of the three crates. I'm quite pleased with the final result, and if it keeps my grass going for a few months, I will be totally satisfied.