We love it when readers send us pictures of their Christmas transformations and these ones have got us rushing to the supermarket and out into the garden.  A big thank you to Beckie Batchelor from The Making Bee for pictures of her fabulous pineapple centrepiece and festive leaf garlands using PlastiKote spray paint. She is going to have one spectacular Christmas!

The pineapple on its own is a glorious example of what a single can of Gold Leaf spray paint can achieve. But we love Beckie’s combination of natural bay leaves and the pineapple sprayed in Gold Leaf   to form a centrepiece that will grace her table on Christmas Day.

 

 

 

Beckie’s leaf garlands are also a triumph. Sprayed in gold leaf and copper they are chic, stylish and bang on trend.

 

 

 

To find out more about Beckie’s work, visit her Facebook page, The Making Bee.

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Thank you to Sarah Horsburgh for sending in this fabulous picture of a chair that she recently recycled using fabric from Laura Ashley and PlastiKote spray paint. This is Sarah’s first spray paint project and we’re sure you will agree she is a natural. We’re also pretty keen on her dog, Missy Elliott, who photo-bombed the final picture!

Sarah said to us: “I got the chair from a local auction house in Derby which was about to throw it away.  I have always loved the shape of it.  It has spent many years in my possession used as a chair to stand on when I am decorating.  I have recently moved house and thought I would give the chair a new lease of life. 

I am assistant manager at Hobbycraft in Stafford so I have no excuse not to be crafty! This is the first time that I have spray painted anything and I have well and truly got the bug and am starting my next project soon.”

 

Before                                                            After

 

 

 

We think the chair (and the dog!) is fabulous and we’ll be sending Sarah some spray paints to thank her for sharing her project with us.

If you have a spray paint project, do please get in touch. Just email  info@spraypaintideas.co.uk including a before and after picture as well as a few sentences about yourself and your project. If we feature your project, we’ll send you some spray paints to say thank you.

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We love how Instagrammer @alljanesthings uses her makeover skills. This is probably one of our favourite tables and the transformation is quite spectacular. Jane explains: I bought this table which has the ‘rust’ look which I hate but I loved the table. I bought PlastiKote Rust Not as I used that on all my wrought iron furniture which was green and rusted and it’s held beautifully.

Here’s the table before the makeover.

 

 

When working with rusty objects our customer services team recommends getting as much of the rust off as possible with a wire brush, then wash with warm soapy water to remove any dirt and grease. No primer is needed with Rust Not. Once thoroughly dry, you can apply spray paint following instructions on the can.

As you can see, it worked beautifully. We want one too!

 

 

To see more of Jane’s projects, go to her Instagram page here.

 

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We love Torie Jayne’s latest craft tutorial so much we just had to share it with you. How clever to think of wine bottles for a vase that would work with a table parasol so that the flowers could be viewed from every angle! Torie Jayne used mini wine bottles and spray paint to create the ombre effect on the vase. We think it should work just as well with  standard wine bottles.

“During the winter I tried a casserole recipe that only required 18cl of red wine, not being big wine drinkers I bought a small bottle to give the recipe a go. We loved the casserole and I loved the empty mini wine bottle so every time I made the casserole I bought more mini bottles of wine. I knew I wanted to use them as vases but wasn’t sure how I would use or decorate them. But after making my new tablecloth and finally deciding on adding an eyelet to the middle so I could use it with a parasol I decided it would be great to make a vase that could sit round the parasol so everyone could enjoy the flowers from whatever angle they were sat at. 

I used seven mini bottles to create a circle and glued them together first using glue suitable for bonding glass. As the tablecloth is in white, mauve and lilac I wanted the vases to be in mint to match my plates but rather than being a solid mint colour I chose to give them a pretty summer ombre effect. 

Tips: Spray painting can be a messy job so I always spray paint outside. To make applying the ombre effect easier I put a stake in the grass and hung the bottles upside down on the stake.”

To go to Torie Jayne’s blog and follow the whole tutorial – as well as pick up some great spray painting tips – click here.

 

 

 

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Beckie Batchelor who owns The Making Bee is one of those truly creative people who can turn her hand to anything, whether it’s running children’s art and crafts workshops, upholstering chairs or making some beautiful Christmas decorations for the local hospice fayre. It’s almost unfair that one person should have all that talent! We’ve chosen to feature one of her practical but stylish kitchen makeovers using PlastiKote spray paint as recycling is part of our theme this month. But do scroll down the page for some of the other fabulous things she has created for her home.

Beckie turned an old cupboard into clever storage by making shelves out of old brown formica worktops and spray painting them.  She also used spray paint on the pine louvred doors. The finishing touch was a set of battery operated lights from IKEA that come on when you open the doors…

 

     From this…                                                   to this!

 

We’ve sent some cans of spray paint to Beckie to say thank you for submitting her kitchen cupboard project. And here are some more of her projects. If you want to see more of Beckie’s work or get in touch with her then click here

    

 

 

 

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We’re loving the inspirational projects Becci Powell has been showcasing on Instragram. You can find Becci (aka becp87) here on Instagram if you want to see more of the great work she has been doing. We spoke to Becci to find out more about her and also about the inspiration behind this particular project:

As a mother taking time out from work, I decided I needed to find a new challenge, that didn’t cost the earth (babies are super expensive, even more so when they turn into toddlers and want EVERYTHING!). That’s when I found my love of crafting and upcycling! 

My main mission was to create a bedroom for my son, made from only repurposed furniture and trying my hand at my own accessories for his room. Then, my mother almost created the BIGGEST sin..she was going to throw out her canisters, which were in perfect condition (though pretty drab to look at).

Already familiar with Plastikote spray paints, I HAD to give them an updated look (I used their Metallics Copper Spray with their Clear Spray Sealer).  Now all our friends and family want them too!

Before

 

During

 

After

 

We think they are fabulous and we’ll be sending Becci some spray paints to thank her for sharing her project with us.

If you have a spray paint project, do please get in touch. Just email info@spraypaintideas.co.uk including a before and after picture as well as a few sentences about yourself and your project. If we feature your project, we’ll send you some spray paints to say thank you.

 

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This month, we celebrate and congratulate Handmade at Highshore, an exciting, creative Enterprise initiative from Highshore School, a Special Needs Secondary School in Camberwell, South London.

From Year 10, students have Enterprise lessons where they set up micro businesses to learn about working together and to raise funds for educational visits and residential trips. In years 12 to 14, students have a whole day of Enterprise each week. A mix of these classes contribute to Handmade At Highshore.

 

 

Handmade At Highshore makes and sells at craft stalls and local markets including Borough Market. Its emphasis is on recycling, repurposing and upcycling. From a financial viewpoint, this keeps the initial outlay on materials to a minimum as their budgets are limited. From an ethical viewpoint, this teaches their students to use their own resourcefulness and creativity in finding new uses for unwanted and discarded items.

 

 

Handmade At Highshore sources materials from Streetbank, donations from the community and local flytipping.

 

 

Projects they do regularly include:

• Making planters from old pallets
• Recycling wool clothes and broken jewellery into felt flower brooches
• Repainting and decoupaging old furniture
• Upcycling bottles, jars and containers
• Making seeded paper cards from eggboxes
• Repainting and repurposing household items.

To find out more about Handmade at Highshore, click here.

We are delighted to be able to support them by donating some cans of spray paint and we look forward to featuring some of their projects in the future.

 

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We love the things that Rachael Jess makes and we’re delighted to feature one of her most recent makeovers – a treasure chest from an old toy box.

Rachael has a beautiful young son and as she works full time, she treasures her weekends and aims to have both days packed out with crafts, events or activities to make precious memories from.  Once her son is asleep, she gets out the Modge Podge, sewing machine or staple gun and upcycles an unloved item she’s found at the local car boot.  It will usually contain a Marvel, Star Wars or Time Lord theme but apparently she sometimes does ‘normal’! To see more of her fabulous projects, visit her website.

As the step-by-step pictures show below, Rachael puts a lot of thought into her projects and we love the map she created for the lid of the treasure chest and the straps with gold coin decorations on the chest.

As a thank you to Rachael, we’re sending her six cans of spray paint for her next project.

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We think Instagrammer Kreamonster is a great upcycler and we love what she has done with PlastiKote spray paint and these animal candleholders!

 

 

We think this upcycled beer bottle is pretty special too!

 

 

If you want to see more of Kreamonster’s projects, click here.

 

 

 

 

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Instagrammer Yvestown has been very clever in giving her display shelves a Hollywood feel by spray painting letters in different PlastiKote spray paint colours. It’s definitely the way to get your name or initials up in lights! If you want to do something similar, we found some lit-up letters on Amazon.

 

If you want to get the whole ‘how to ‘ from Yvestown or want to see more of her projects, click here.

 

 

 

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