Yes you can spend countless hours on the net looking at ideas and design. I know a lot of my hours are spent looking! This is a great idea. I have a giant platter cover (from work parties) that has a fancy design in the lid. I want to use it to make stepping stones. I wonder if it is too thin? Or if I use it, it won't be usable for a second time. I have not dabbled in concrete at all...chomping at the bit here as well.

Uhoh-hadn't thought of that as I was picturing various mouse ears in the top part and others in the lower sections. Did realize that we will need to drill drainage (forgot that with fountains-no holes)! Hmmm...maybe they ARE nice water bowls...

I can't help you with a place to buy in your area (my favorite is Frazier's off Hwy 290 and Hwy 6) but make sure you can unload the thing before you buy. Even the small ones can weigh a lot. A couple of years ago, I went crazy and bought three or four planters.....had the men load it into my truck and went home. My husband took one look and said "and exactly HOW are we going to unload these? They must weigh 500 lbs each!" So with an afternoon of trying to figure it out (with my poor husband and three worthless females - myself and two teenage girls), we struggled and managed to unload them without landing someone in the hospital with a crushed foot or strained spine. Or divorce court. Where they sit now is where they remain for the rest of all eternity! The house may blow down but my lion planters will remain! Here is a picture of one of them, planted with Thunbergia: (p.s. I like them so much I'm going back soon for a couple more!) Lynn

One thing about OP's planters-they are quite deep. As such, it is entirely possible, even likely, that roots will never get out of that "vault". I'm talking soil oxygen. Down deep, there usually isn't any and where there's no O2, roots don't grow. So any chance of "escape" may be only a dream. I've got a whole business district/main commercial street of this city in which such vaults were (accidentally) built for the trees. To translate that to English, we re-did our main drag some 15 years ago. I was on the committee as was our city forester. He and I both called for curbing, to keep the constant flow of salty water (winter de-icers) out of them all winter. so far, so good. What we did not spec was 4-foot frost footings-necessary in this climate for foundations and such. We got them anyway. Those trees are trapped in these structures-no roots can ever make their way out. For me-the guy that has to try to grow annuals and perennials in and around these trees, it has become hellish, the entire "soil" in these things being nearly 100% tree roots. Bad for the trees, bad for the ornamental plantings. Anyway, Just wanted to point out that at the depth these things are built, no root growth beyond the perimeter is likely.