DIY Patent Wall Art using Recycled wood

These walls have been bare too long. I have been thinking of putting something fun and impactful on these for a REALLY long time. I contemplated doing some art of my own, but one fine day watching Fixer Upper, I got the idea of using some Patent Art on the walls! (I love you, Joanna!) I knew that they would be the perfect fun quirky pop of color on these boring white walls without going over the top.

{Warning: This is an image heavy post!}

 

Right in the middle of the wall is a door to my craft room, hence making it trickier to decorate:

Then started my research on vintage patent artwork and came across the Google Patents website online. You can find patents on all sorts of things here.

Since this is a part of my Coffee Room, and I recently installed my Penny-farthing Cycle planter on my DIY Faux Copper Patina wall, I thought, what better than to have something related to "cycle" and "coffee"? I could not believe the amazing stuff I found on this site on just the two of these! I shortlisted a few, and downloaded them for my personal use. From what I know, the text and the drawing of a patent are not subject to copyright restrictions and the images are free for personal use. If you want to use an image for something other than your own personal use you may have to check with a lawyer or the patent owner. I did not have to worry since these were for my home.

However, since my walls are white, I wasn't too happy with this color combination.

Using Adobe Photoshop, the colors were inverted quickly to produce some super fun black and white images, and printed on A3 sheets. You could convert them to colors of your choice as per the decor in the room, but these were perfect for mine.

 

Supplies needed:

• Inkjet printer (for printing patent art)
• Old fence wood/ pallet wood or similar
• Sander
• Wood glue
• Clamps/weights
• Nails
• Screws
• Hammer
• Thin wire 
• Mod Podge (or similar glue)

1. Out of the four, I selected three for print, still contemplating how many to hang, whether to cover both sides of the door or just one. My final images were approximately 28.5 cm X 41 cm in size. I decided to leave the white borders.

2. After this, we started work on the wood base. We had some left over old fence wood, so we gathered that for the project. 

3. Then we lay out the printed art on the wood pieces to have an idea of how big we wanted the backing to be. My backing is 16 cms taller and 9.2 cms wider than my patent images. So, we cut the wood pieces, and began to sand to make it a little smoother.

4. We attached cross braces on the back to make it sturdy. We used wood glue and the old nails with hammer to keep them in place.

Here is how it looks in the front:

There were some paint drips that I missed so I sanded it again.

6. Then was the fun part of pasting the patent image to the pallet wood. I tried to measure to make sure the image was centered from all four sides. Then I glued it with Mod Podge, but you can use any similar type of adhesive. Make sure you remove any air bubbles as it dries.

As you can see, I decided to go with the coffee pot and the penny farthing cycle images since both of these were most relevant.

I managed to get some wrinkles on mine, but I think they added some old world charm, so left it anyway. I Mod Podged the rest of the wood too to make the wood color consistent.

 

Then I left it to air dry.

7. Now for hanging the art on the wall, we used small screws on both edges of the cross braces and then wrapped a wire around them.

 



..and ta-da!

7. Here is how they look on my wall. I think they look fab!! (We had everything at home, so yep, this project is complete without spending a single penny!)

I thought the white edge of the patent art was a little too white, so with some diluted brown acrylic paint, I painted it to distress it a little.

 



I love how the brown of the wood complements the wood floor and parts of the Faux Copper Patina wall.

To reiterate what it looked like before, here's a quick Before and After:

Here are some extra images I had created, but decided not to use. Feel free to use them, or check out others on the Google Patents website:

 

YAY! Thrilled with the final outcome of this project!
{I think Joanna would be proud! :) }

Hope you are inspired to do something fun with what you have at home!

Love,

Divya

DIY Pantry Door Upgrade!

Our open plan living-dining-kitchen area works great for all purposes, but I wanted to add some fun to this boring kitchen pantry wall. We have two big pantry cupboards which I love, but all seemed too white in this area of the home with no texture or interest.



I, of course Googled and Pinterested (is that even a word?) around to get a lot of ideas, and the most inspirational for me was this blog from Sherri. I wanted to convert my pantry flat doors into a paneled door with trim and a chalkboard.

I'm sure you've seen lots and lots of blog posts of completely transformed doors, and I am going to share with you one simple transformation that is so easy and fab to do, and the best part is you can use this method to dress up whichever room door you like.

Supplies:

• Decorative trim (We got this one from Bunnings)
• Tape measure
• Tooth saw
• Pencil 
• Clear timber varnish
• Miter box (for cutting at 45 degree angles)
• Liquid nails/Wood glue
• Door Primer (We used some wall primer we had lying around the house from when we painted the walls)
• Paints:
      - Acrylic paint (if you want to paint your trims)
      - Chalkboard paint
• Sanding block/Sand paper/ Sanding machine
• Spirit level 

DIY Rug Makeover

Do you have a dingy sad-looking rug sitting somewhere in your house? Instead of tossing it or hiding it, you might try giving it a new look with the help of painter's tape and acrylic paint.

Here's what my rug looked like before the start of the project. Sad, faded, and crying out for a refresh:

Since my rug had a crisp contemporary pattern, I did not have to remake a design with the painter's tape, but instead filled in the existing design with paint. Instead of spending the money on a brand new rug, painting it was a good solution.

See the difference between the painted and the non-painted areas:

Using standard acrylic paint in cobalt blue and black, I gave the rug one coat of paint. 

It took me only a few hours to finish this project, but love the pop of color! 

And, here is how it looks in its original space. What a massive difference!

Are you going to give your rug a makeover? Let me know if you decide to give this a shot!