Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Painting an antique look .. First try

So, Andy over at Poppies at Play always does awesome antiquing-looking-painting using gel stain, so I thought I'd better pick some up and try it. I had looked at Michaels a couple days earlier, and they didn't have any, but the next time I was at Wal-mart, I checked there, and they had a can. I thought Andy's came in a tube, but I figured.. how different could it be? Well.. I think the one I bought had spoiled somehow.. (don't ask me how that happens??) because it wasn't the color it looked like it would be on the can "honey maple" ( I wanted a darker color, but that's all they had ).. and I knew it wouldn't look exactly like the color on the can, but it was straight orange, and it was.. lumpy. Very lumpy. I tried stirring it, but there was no getting it smooth, it was like chili! It was too gross to post a picture of, I'm serious! Now, I'm no expert, but I don't think that's how it's supposed to be..



Anyways, I really wanted to try the antiquing technique on one of my jewelry frames, so I thought of an alternative. I got some dark acrylic paint and diluted it with water, almost half and half. I had already distressed my frame and then once I painted on the watered-down-paint, I let it sit for half a minute, and then wiped it off with a paper towel. It left the stain on the creases and cracks, and corners that I had sanded, but I was able to rub it off everywhere else.



It gives it a similar effect, so I was happy with it. next time, I just won't go so sand paper happy cause the paint seeped into all the scratches, and I had sanded the front of the frame too, a little bit so it didn't look so polished, but now it has lots of brown scratches on the front. Anyways, I think it worked for what I had at the time, and I'll just have to take that other gel-stain back! Gross!



Have you ever used the gel stain or tried to antique something? Do you have any other antiquing tips?? I'd sure appreciate any of your ideas!

1 comment:

Andy Porter said...

Of course I love how it turned out and I'm so happy it's MINE!! It's so cute and I had almost forgotten that I had it until I was cleaning up and then I was so excited to go and hang it that I just left everything else and put all my necklaces on it. I'm so glad that you came today. It was so fun to meet you in person and thanks for all the hard work you put in. You are awesome!!