Saturday, March 2, 2013

Adding French Flavour to a Wood Tray


BEFORE-ish
During the Christmas season, the office I work in received a gift of a nut basket.  Only the "basket" was actually a wood tray.  Guess who brought the tray home... yep, that would be me and my scrounging ways again.

It was just a cheapo dark stained wood and of course I forgot to take a photo of it before I began creating my masterpiece, so here is a reasonable facsimile, except it looks really nice & my tray did not look this good!

I painted it basic white and it sat for a couple of months until I saw this graphic from the Graphics Fairy:


The Graphics Fairy - DIY: French Transfer Printable - Paris Typography

 Love, love, love this!!!   

I knew I wanted this image on the tray.  I considered the different ways of transferring the image.  I don't like the mod podge method because it creates a bumpy surface and I don't want a bumpy surface on a tray that I plan to use.  So instead I scribbled all over the back of my printout with an HB pencil and I hand traced this onto my tray.

Then I went over the letters with Sharpies - an ultra fine point and a fine point.


 Very, very time consuming and I almost gave up a couple of times but oh, am I glad I kept going!!!

I left it to dry for a couple of days and then sanded the surface with a fine grit sanding sponge.  Then I waxed the tray with Minwax Dark Paste Wax to protect the surface.



TAH DAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!



How awesome is this?!!!  I am in love.

May all your projects work out as beautifully as this one did for me!!!



Cheers!
Don't miss another post!  Follow me:
Visit thecsiproject.com

And then this project was named one of the
top 10 Subway Art projects!  Hooray!



Eclectically Vintage

Labels: , , ,

35 comments:

  1. Beautifully done Anne. Isn't it satisfying when a project turns out exactly as you envisaged.
    I'd love it if you'd consider linking your tray up at Shabbilicious Friday, where we embrace all that is shabby, French and vintage.

    ReplyDelete

  2. Nice that at the end of the process, you consider it worth the effort. Very rewarding. It's lovely.

    ReplyDelete

  3. Hi, Anne. This is gorgeous! Glad you kept at it with the Sharpies! Here comes a bad pun. It's tray chic!

    ReplyDelete

  4. Beautiful work of art Anne! Now when you pull that out with company over and they ask where did you buy that you can say.....well I made it thank you :-)
    xx
    Anne

    ReplyDelete

  5. Oh get out of town! That is absolutely BEAU!!!

    I know what you mean about throwing in the towel on those letters! I made several huge signs recently and can someone say CARPAL TUNNEL? Yikes! But once they're complete....oh so sweet!

    Oh and I'm SO not surprised that you went home with the tray. Who wants a nut basket when you can LIVE LIKE ONE!?
    XO

    ReplyDelete

  6. I don't blame you for grabbing that tray, Anne- you made it so pretty and romantic. I love French graphics, and Karen has the best. You have much more patience than I, to do all that work by hand!

    ReplyDelete

  7. Your stick to it determination really was worth it; it's lovely, Anne. Good on ya girl.

    ReplyDelete

  8. That is gorgeous Anne, you did a wonderful job on it, love how you styled it too!

    ReplyDelete

  9. Oh la la! Beautiful Parisian breakfast!

    ReplyDelete

  10. So pertty Anne! I am going to try this myself, thank you for the inspiration. Your photos are lovely too!

    ReplyDelete

  11. So pretty Anne! I just love it! I have a tray makeover in the works too ...

    :) Linda

    ReplyDelete

  12. I love it! Thanks for sharing. Blessings from your neighbor to the south, Patti@OldThingsNew

    ReplyDelete

  13. Anne ... so glad you did not give up on that piece. It is lovely and you did an excellent job of penning in all those fancy letters. I don't think I could have done it. Would take a steady hand, which I do not have. Thanks for sharing the idea ... I have several trays that need something.
    Blessings,
    Audrey Z. @ Timeless Treasures

    ReplyDelete

  14. Another makeover masterpiece, Anne! I'm in love with this tray, and the vignette you created. Your persistence paid off. So pretty.

    ReplyDelete

  15. Great job! I love that you ended up tracing the letters...not much fun, but the hand lettering gives it that much more charm. It's just beautiful Anne. Well done!

    Debbie

    ReplyDelete

  16. Love it! I recently took a Bombay photo tray and did the same thing, lightening it up with paint. Haven't done the graphic yet, but now you've inspired me to do something Parisian.

    ReplyDelete

  17. Oh, I love this tray~so pretty! I bet it was time consuming but oh la la~~ look at it now! Gorgeous.

    ReplyDelete

  19. Just lovely Anne, you've done a beautiful job with that tray!

    ReplyDelete

  20. Love the way this turned out! ...thinking about copying it!

    ReplyDelete

  22. I've used the same transfer method before...the redneck version...and it is very time consuming but worth it. I think it looks better than modpodge, personally.

    ReplyDelete

  23. well that turned out great!!! I have an old tray and I was gonna just chalk paint it...never even thought about this..thanks for sharing

    ReplyDelete

  24. Love your tray! I just used the same method on this bench a couple of weeks ago but used sidewalk chalk instead of pencil. SO SO time consuming. And I used chalk paint which dried the Sharpie so fast. I'd love for you to check out mine! Great job!!
    http://iknowtheplansihave4you.blogspot.com/2013/02/labor-of-love-bench-redo.html?m=1

    ReplyDelete

  25. Great job! I'm not nearly crafty enough to even think of something like that let alone do it....

    ReplyDelete

  27. Really, really beautiful! I found you at the Inspire Me Please link party--thanks for sharing!

    ~Abby =)

    ReplyDelete

  28. I have being eying that Paris image looking for a special place to put it. Your tray is perfect. I love not only that it is it pretty, it is practical.

    ReplyDelete

  29. Nice job! I love making over ugly trays, and I love how your turned out!

    ReplyDelete

  31. Such a pretty tray and it looks super easy! :)

    ReplyDelete

  32. Un laborioso y bello trabajo.
    Un abrazo¡

    ReplyDelete

  33. oohh la la Anne-- love it! I have one I'm about to do... I might use this technique.
    catching you!
    gail

    ReplyDelete

  34. You know I love sharpie DIY's!! Gorgeous tray! Pinning this to the group pinboard for It's party time linky party! Thanks for sharing :D

    ReplyDelete

Thanks so much for stopping by and leaving a comment. I respond to comments through email. If I can't respond to you by email (no reply blogger), I'll leave a reply under your comment. Hope you have a fabulous day!

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...