Altered wooden Box....Birthday Box for ma wee Mamma and Crackle technique Tutorial

Altered wooden Box....Birthday Box for ma wee Mamma and Crackle technique Tutorial

From this....

To this.

This is a wee altered box I made for ma wee Mamma's birthday on the 13th there.  Now, I'm not completely happy with it.  Its ok, but it didn't quite turn out quite like I wanted.  I would have liked a better swirly bling which would start in the corner and go out to the middle but unfortunately I didn't have any so had to make do with what I had.

This is a bit of show and tell.  I am going to do a tutorial on how to do the crackle technique below.

I decorated the box with some lace that I fanned in the top corner and used one of my fluffy vintage handmade flowers as the centre piece flower and the just used some roses from Wild Orchid Crafts that came in a kit I bought.  SHOCK HORROR......there are flowers on a project that I didn't personally make!!  I had plenty of handmade flowers but not the right colour and as time was ticking on....I cheated and used the WOC flowers.

I made my own stick pins and used some bling in the opposite corner which wasn't quite right as I said but it was all I hand.  I adorned it with gold trim and an aqua blue lace.  Then inside, shown below, I simply used decorative paper and mod podged over it.  Then added some gathered lace and a cameo to the inside lid.  As a little opener, I used a navy button and the little bling part below it is off some jewellery I dismantled.

Now for the tutorial.......

WHAT YOU NEED

A plain box 

Acrylic paints and crackling medium (or pva glue)

You need a box to alter.  I usually take the hinges off so they dont get painted over then put back on afterwards.

Acrylic paints.  One for the base colour.....usually a darker colour.  And then your top coat colour....usually lighter.

Crackle medium OR Pva glue.

Paint brush

Heat tool (optional....usually for impatient people like me!!)

1. Mixed my colour for base

2. Paint over box and dry

Ok, so crackle paint is a fantastic technique to make your projects look weathered.  There are so many ways to achieve this look.  Tim Holtz has Crackle paints that already are acrylic paints with the crackle medium in it, so you dont have to use a separate crackle medium or pva glue.  You can use crackle medium like Im using or pva glue.  All give fantastic results.

You need to decide what colour you want your cracks to appear.  So whatever colour that is, will be your base colour.  I usually go for a darker colour as the base and then a lighter top colour. So I wanted my cracks to be blue with a cream top coat.

I mixed my colours to a blue I was happy with...see photo 1. I painted my box all over the outside with the blue and used my heat tool to dry it.  If you are a patient person, you can leave it to air dry.  To be honest, acrylic paint dries extremely quick, particularly on wood.  See photo 2.  You will see that the box isn't perfectly painted, there are bits that you can still see the wood underneath.  But this was fine for me. But if you want even coverage, you may wish to do another coat of paint.  But I wanted mine to look rustic.

3. Once undercoat is dry, paint medium on

Now for the fun part.  Once your undercoat is completely dry its time to paint on your crackle medium or pva.  The technique for both crackle medium and pva is pretty much the same.  So where I say crackle medium, if you are using pva glue just do the same technique.

I paint on a medium thickness and even coverage of the crackle medium over the box.  The thinner the layer, the thinner your cracks will appear. The thicker layer, the thicker cracks.  Now, depending on the way you paint it on will give you the direction of the cracks.  So if you paint the crackle medium on horizontally, you will have horizontal cracks on your wood.

You need to leave the crackle medium (or pva) to dry until its just tacky.  Depending on the amount you have on, this could be 10-30mins.  You can also speed this process up by using your heat too.  BUT dont go too close as you can bubble the medium and paint.  You may look at your project and think it looks a bit patchy as it dries.....don't panic, this is normal. See photo 3.

Excuse the messy desk!

The cracks appear whilst drying

Close up

When your medium (pva) is tacky, its time to put your top coat colour on.  I paint on an even coverage (not too thick, but not too thin either!) and I immediately start to see the cracks appear.  Allow to dry naturally or dry with your heat tool.  You can then leave it like this or if you want to distress it more, you can use sand paper on the edges and Tim Holtz distress inks too.  You can also protect the surface by putting a coat of mod podge over it once its dry.

Here's my completed box.

As I said, I'm not completely satisfied or happy with it but then Im my own worst critic.  And ma wee Mamma loved it, and I may be 31 but she still told me off for being so hard on myself!  My Mammy scolded me on her birthday!!!  

Any comments or questions you are are always greatly received.  

Toodles Noodles....Loops.  xx

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