Ohmygoodness. I am so excited to share this project! I have had this idea floating in my head for months and now I get to share the results. The concept of painted chevron first came to mind after reading Kelly + Olive’s post about DIY Chevron. I followed their instructions and used the pattern linked to their post.
Here is how it works.
Materials Used:
- 3 22×28″ stretched canvases (each one cost about $22)
- Bronze gold acrylic paint ($10)
- Large, soft bristled brush ($10)
- 1 roll blue painters tape ($4)
- Chevron pattern stencil found on Sunset.com via Kelly and Olive (free)
First, I printed out the stencil three times to get the right length for my canvases. I carefully trimmed the paper to include just the zig-zag and then taped them together to get the correct width.
Do these canvases look familiar? I decided I can always recreate the string art look on new canvases, and in the meantime save some $$ by reusing the two I already had.
To transfer the zig-zag pattern from the paper stencil to the canvas, I used a thumb tack to mark each of the points on the zig zags. I did this for both stripes on the stencil and then used blue painters tape to fill in where the white zig-zag was on the stencil. The thumb tack prints helped me know where to start and stop the tape.
I found lining up a whole bunch of tape makes the process quicker.
Once canvas was complete with the zig-zag, I taped the sides as well to keep them white. I also used a credit card to smooth down all the lines and make sure there wouldn’t be any paint leaking into the stripe pattern.
After that, I just needed to paint the canvases with a solid coat of paint. It didn’t take nearly as much paint as I thought it would. I got all three canvases painted with one tube of paint, and I still have paint left over. The canvases needed about 20 minutes to dry and then I removed the painters tape.
I love how the metallic bronze paint shines against the solid white stripe.
Voila! The finished product. Courtney and Lauren came over and helped me hang the art - with thumb tacks! Who knew.
May 15th, 2012 at 10:33 pm
that is great love the work