I swear 9 times out of 10 I go onto Facebook Market place and I spot a piece of furniture that I want to buy. And this blanket box was no exception. I mean who can resist a bargain like this when it’s only £10? And it’s HUGE! .. I actually started referring to it as “The Bungalow”
When I first started painting this blanket box I had no idea what it was going to turn out like. I was pretty much just winging it. Sure, I had an idea of the kind of colours and finish I was aiming for, but had no idea whether it was going to look right. But that’s the magic of paint – if you don’t like it, you paint over the top of it! Just like it never happened ..
here’s what you need
After the usual cleaning process (washing it down with sugar soap) I used Rustoleum Graphite for the base before doing a LOT of dry brushing with their Chalk white paint to get the distressed look. Check out this video for the dry brushing technique 🙂
Creating the top of the blanket box
I used the Graphite and the White Chalk paint to blend the colours for the top of the blanket box.
Now, you know I do like to add a bit of glitter and glam. For someone who likes a lot of colour (anyone else just neeeed some colour?!) it was all looking a bit too grey .. so, Rustoleum silver paint to the rescue! 🙂 It didn’t add any colour as such but just enough to add some sparkle to the edges of the top and the sides. However, even with the silver the top was still far to grey for my liking.
It needed a stencil, which I created on my Silhouette Cameo. I’m sure you’ve hear me mention it before (that’s because I’m just a little bit obsessed with it!) and I highly recommend it for creating your own stencils and vinyl cutting!
Anyway, I created the stencil by buying the Game of Thrones font on Etsy here and downloading it to he Silhouette Cameo. I created a stencil from vinyl which was added to the top of the box. But not before adding a coat of lacquer first. I wanted to make sure that the paint didn’t come off when peeling away the vinyl stencil.
EEK!!
Well, .. wanna know a little secret? Sometimes you can do all of the things right, .. and it will still go wrong 🙁 .. See my little mini disaster below ..
As I pulled off the stencil, some of the base paint came with it. I have no idea how it happened, BUT as it happened, I really liked it! So, after my little melt down and a cup of coffee later, I repeated the process on the whole of the box. Turns out, it breaks up that large grey area and gives the blanket box an authentic “worn” feel. I guess sometimes things happen for a reason! You’ve just got to rock with it and make it work.
And this is the finished article after it had two more coats of polyurethane varnish. What do you reckon? It’s just perfect for hiding all those throws and cushions in the “man cave” in our garden. And it doubles up as a seat too.
Update. – My little peel away disaster must have happened for a reason as the blanket box won one of the runner up prices in the Rustoleum “Make it Yours’ competition 🙂 Whoop Whoop!! 6 cans of spray for more projects to share with you guys. Here’s what I did with one of them!
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