Lace Crazy: A Gypsy / Boho Painting Technique...

Our little Grandson Journey asked his Poppa to "Build him a house"...
We have thought and plotted, planned and gathered. We have been treasure hunting for 6 months and plotting the layout of the perfect little play house for all of our "Grand Little's"...

There's a Little Gypsy that lives inside of me and I was so excited to make it a little Gypsy / Bohemian Playhouse theme...

We have finally gathered enough of the 'right size' little shelves and cupboards to begin their little kitchen, so I started with 'boho' paint jobs on the little cupboards. I just finished these 2 nights ago and wanted to show you the process, because they turn out so cute...

It's quite a project and it definitely takes patience and a couple days time working through the various steps and stages to create your masterpiece...

But, it's so worth it, if you're trying to achieve an antique Boho look...

I intend to stock these little cupboards with some old tins from an anitque store.

I figure I can put little trinkets in the tins and use them for toy storage.

The whole playhouse is going to be full of fun surprises~!

So stay tuned...

If you would like to see the 'picture rich' tutorial of how to create your own Bohemian / Gypsy cupboard / shelf, click here...

I have already finished quite a series of little cupboards and shelves for their playhouse and even a cute little high chair, I used the same process for each piece.

Every item has been from a thrift store. The whole series of little pieces here cost me less than $40 + the paint and supplies to redo them.

Some of the pieces were plain wood when I acquired them. Some were already painted with various mediums and I just repainted them Boho style.

Step #1:

Prime the piece you're going to paint with a thick layer of white gesso. You can find gesso in the acrylic and oil paint section at a craft store. They use it mainly to prime canvas before painting. When its dry, it gives a really rough, chalky feel to the piece you're going to paint. And, it's a great base primer layer for the sanding stage.

The left one is what both little shelves looked like when I bought them at a thrift store. They were painted a country blue and they were $4 each. The Man-Child tacked a piece of board on the backs of both for me. They were 'open backed' when I purchased them
The right one is what they look like with a thick layer of gesso primer. I just use cheap chip brushes and I just get it on there. No need to be careful, or have nice brush strokes the crazy way I paint...

Step #2:

Paint the piece the base color of your choice. In this case, I chose rainbow colors because it's for the Little's playhouse. I just used cheap acrylic tole paint. I just squeezed all the colors on a Dixie plate and started slapping them on. To simplify cleaning the brush between colors, I just filled the kitchen sink half full of hot water and dipped the brush, swirled it around and dried in a paper towel and moved on to the next color. It didn't take much time to do this step.

Let it dry well between coats of paint...

Step # 3:

Add more layers of paint, multiple colors of your choice. For these 2 little cupboards, I covered them with some ivory paint...

Put the paint on in random directions. You Don't want it perfect at all...

When the ivory was dry, I filled in the holes where the rainbow color was showing through with some white...

Then, I let it dry all night so all of the paint was really set before the next step.

Step #4: Sanding...

The following morning, when all of the paint layers are really dry and set, take the piece outside and use a palm sander to really rough it up. I use medium grit sandpaper. You'll get the feel of taking off paint as you start sanding. Use your sander to make the piece soft and layered. In some places, I'll go all the way to the wood. Or, I'll use the tip of my sander to push really hard and chip off some pieces of paint here and there. It's not easy, but it's not too hard, but it is worth it!

The top one has been sanded down showing the various layers of color underneath.The right one has not been sanded.

It took 4 sanding pads per cupboard to achieve the look I wanted...

And yes, my hand hurt when I was done. It took me about an hour to sand both cupboards...

This is what they looked like with the sanding stage completed...

You could stop here and seal them and be done, but I like to antique my pieces. I like soft and old, not bright and new, so I kept going...

Step #5: Decoupage...

Since these little cupboards are for a Boho/Gypsy playhouse, I found some cute images by searching on google and just printing them out on regular copy paper. The images come out a bit pixilated, but it turns out just fine. Actually, it makes the images softer at the end.

I use 'Mod-Podge' to glue the paper images to the project. For these little cupboards, I used a matte finish and I layered images I liked in multiple layers. It takes more images than one realizes. It took 38 pages of images to finish these cupboards and most of the day cutting out pictures and gluing them down.

I think the main rule when you decoupage, is to keep your item balanced.

It's harder than you might think...

If it's too image heavy on one side, it may look like it's about to fall off the wall ~

\=)

I added a lot of little fun things to these cupboards for the 'Little's'...

Everything I've painted for their playhouse has "Secrets..."

The painted items are like, "I-Spy," or "Where's Waldo" - investigating the pieces reveal the secrets~!

You could stop here if you're satisfied with your masterpiece and then just seal it with Mod-Podge spray sealer, or a thin coat of polyurethane. I wanted these soft and old and Boho, so I continued to the next step...

Step #6: Antiquing~

I antique different pieces I paint with different processes and different mediums. I don't use stain to antique a decoupaged piece because the stain won't adhere to mod-podge. I don't use antiquing wax either because it has a strange chemical reaction...

I like to antique a decoupaged piece with Folkart brand Antiquing Medium. For these little kitchen cupboards, I used a color called, "Antigua." It gave them the perfect aged look.

This pic shows the difference between a piece that I've used antiquing medium on and a piece that just been painted and decoupaged. I also like to antique my decoupaged pieces because the antiquing medium hides and softens the decoupage. You have to touch it to feel the paper cutouts. They're hard to see...