I have been putting more effort and attention towards decorating my home and I have been pinning like crazy! I decided that I would keep pinning, but also start doing. I am determined to beautify my home, wall by wall, from wall decor to furniture pieces against the wall, and in the words of Jay Z, "I'm focused man!" I helped my husband finish 1 out of 3 rooms in our basement (pics coming soon!). I have been doing a lot of DIY projects for myself as well as others. I purchased a cute little buffet cabinet a couple weeks ago and am currently working on refinishing that. I have 2 console tables that need work. Here I go rambling. Let me just get into the details of the topic.
About a month ago, after seeing some gorgeous abstract art DIYs on Pinterest, I took matters into my own hands and put my own artistic vision onto a canvas. Okay honestly, the last half of that sentence sounded really good, didn't it? I thought I worded that like a true artist lol. The truth is, I had a specific color scheme I wanted, I didn't know what in the world I was doing.
I didn't take any photos during the process because I was so nervous that it wouldn't turn out good, but I'll list the tutorials I relied on and try my best to simply explain what I did. I'm horrible at giving extra detailed instructions so I apologize in advance!
Supplies:
- A canvas. I bought 2- 16"x20" for $8 at Hobby Lobby. They're the same price after taxes at Walmart.
- 4 different sized paint brushes (all flat). The sizes depend on how wide you want your stripes and if you want them all to be even or not.
- Gold or silver metallic spray paint OR gold leaf foil.
- You can use whatever colors you want. I used navy, gold, pearl white, off-white, blue, black, and brown acrylic paint (purchased at Walmart for less than $1 each!). I actually did not have brown or ivory so I had to mix tan, burgundy, and black to make brown. I mixed tan and white to make an ivory, cream color.
- A cup of water to clean your brushes.
- Easel (optional). I created a makeshift easel.
My process:
1. I didn't have any gold leaf foil so I used the gold spray paint and gold acrylic paint I had on hand. I spray painted my entire canvas gold.
2. I followed the tutorial from the video below, however, I left the gold visible horizontally in the center of the canvas. I mixed paints to get desired colors.
3. I added the ivory, off-white and mixed it with the other colors. I lightly painted over colors. I also used water to add a light, watercolor look on certain parts. I didn't have a specific way of doing it, I just wanted to lighten it up and add different warm tones. I tweaked it to my liking.
4. I made extra random gold spots above and below the horizontal gold line with the gold acrylic paint, trying to mimic an ikat fabric pattern.
5. I traced around a few gold spots with the black paint, again, mimicking an ikat pattern. I make quick strokes up & down, very closely together, to avoid smooth lines. On a couple, I kept the outline light and I didn't go around the entire gold spot.
Inspiration:
I was inspired by the following pins and video helped me tremendously (source below each):
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| LiveLoveDIY |
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| BlueberryGlitter Etsy Shop |
For more DIY ideas:
Looks good and very professional. I would buy it :-)
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