Tutorial: Hand-painted detail, the easy way

I'll be the first one to tell you that I can't free-hand paint worth beans. Once in a while I'll try it, but I'm usually not very happy with the results. It takes patience, practice, a steady hand and skill. I really can't claim to have any of those. So when I want to add some detail to a piece, I have to kind of, um, cheat. A little bit.

Take this chair, for instance. I shared it a while ago.
It needed some more interest so I painted a bird on the back.

I DID NOT free-hand paint the bird. I traced it. I'm going to show you how I did the same thing to this shelf thingy.

Before I could paint, though, I wanted to take full advantage of the design of this shelf. I added a dowel rod to the bottom so that it could be a a shelf and a towel or blanket rack.

Now to paint the detail. First, choose your image and print it to the size you want. Then scribble all over the BACK of the design with pencil.

Turn the image face up, position it the way you want on your piece and trace it, applying plenty of pressure with your pencil.

This will transfer the graphite from the back of the paper onto your surface and give you a nice clear guide for painting.

Then it's just a matter of filling it in or tracing over the lines with paint. Erase any showing pencil marks after it's dry and you're done!

Bear with me- I had some fun dressing up this new shelf.

It'd look great in a bathroom.

Or in a kitchen.

Or anywhere just holding your treasures.






I'm linking up to Wendy's party!