Upcycling Glass Jar

Today I am sharing the technique I used to create the toothbrush holder written about in my last post.

  

1. Draw out the design you want on a piece of paper. Make sure before drawing that you fix the width of your drawing as per the size of the bottle you want to paint. We don’t want any pattern overlaps now!

2. Affix this paper inside the bottle using tape so that when you paint on the outside, the design doesn’t move.

3. Now paint directly or draw out outlines using a non-permanent marker. 4. Fill in all the details of your design, including a background. Tip: If you want to add a background to your creation, then ensure you start the painting process with that. It’ll be easier to paint on the design details over the background color rather than make your background fit in with the lines of your design. The second alternative if you are using a wide-mouth jar is to paint in the background color from the inside of the bottle. 5. Enjoy your creation! :)

P.S. - Remember the bottle-vases I painted a few months back? You can catch them in action here.

Painted Toothbrush Holder

Have just finished painting on a jam bottle with my ceramic paints. And voila! It has metamorphosed into a toothbrush holder for the kids’ bathroom.

Froggy with his red umbrella and the giant mushrooms all add a dash of fun to the morning chore of brushing, making it that much easier for the kids and us.


This time I tried a more complicated design than my previous attempts at painting on glass bottles. And learnt some invaluable lessons.

I used Fevicryl’s ceramic paint pack which comes with basic colors. The paints are so quick-drying that you cannot work with them under a fan. Mixing colors is also pretty tough since you have to constantly keep thinning them with water else they dry up. And all that water wrecks color consistency.

So while this activity requires immense patience and a fair amount of careful planning before you start, the end result more than makes up for it. When my kids saw their new brush holder, they made friends with Froggy instantly and loved the mushrooms. :)


I’ll share the technique I used to paint this bottle in my next post.