Upcycle An Old Trunk, Part 3: Painted Faux Leather

In the last post I talked about relining an old trunk, in this one I'm gonna paint it.






First I mixed some black and brown paint together to make a super dark brown and painted it on the tray and inside the trunk.

Next I took some brown craft paint in a shade that was dark, but still lighter than the last color (for this I'm using the one on the left) and put just a bit of it in a small container. Then I dipped my brush in just a bit an wiped that tiny bit of paint back and forth to spread it through the brush. The idea is to have very little paint on the brush. The bristles should be almost dry.





I painted this color very lightly over the darker one just barely grazing the surface at first, then pressing a little bit harder as the brush started to run dry. If this is done right more of the paint should come off on the higher parts of the wrinkles and less on the lower. I had to be careful not to completely cover the first (darker) coat.






Here's a close-up of what it looks like when it's dry. I probably covered about three quarters of the first coat putting it thicker in some places and thinner in others at random.










Then I took my lightest color and did the same thing, but this time I went even lighter than the last. This color is supposed to be just the highlights.










When these colors go on they look really light and bright, but darken as they dry. (In case you're wondering where that nifty little paint tray came from it's a package that some washers came in)












Here's a close-up of the finished job.

An here's the finished trunk interior before a clear coat of poly. Sometimes the the poly will re-wet the craft paint, but if I avoid any excess strokes it won't be too bad.

                                                                           

Remember...Do Not Taunt the Sasquatch! 

Upcycle an Old Trunk, Part 2: Relining and Old Trunk

This is a trunk I'm making for my Etsy shop
I'm going to be painting it in a faux leather finish. I posted about this eariler in this blog, this post is going into alot more detail, and feature a lot more pictures. I'm starting with relining the tray, but everything here will apply to relining the inside of the trunk too.

Stuff you'll need:
tape measure, large square, pencil, scissors, an iron, and plain craft paper.


 Before starting I removed any loose old paper, this didn't take long as most of it was pretty secure.

First I measured the sides of the tray. I doubled the height dimension as I would be starting on the inside and wrapping the paper around to the outside, then I added an inch and a half to both dimensions so there would be some overlap. I measured out my pieces, making sure they were square, and cut all of them out.

 To texture the paper to make it look like leather I crumpled and uncrumpled it about 6 or 8 times.

 Then I ironed it, being sure not to completely remove all the wrinkles. It made the texture awesome.

Next I poured out a little mod podge on the surface I was papering and spread it around with a brush. This is a lot faster than just painting it on. I also made sure to spread it up the adjacent sides.

 Then I laid on my paper overlapping the other sides just a bit. I had to work fast as the mod podge tends to dry fairly quick. Starting in the middle I gently pressed it down working out any air bubbles as I worked my way to the edges. I used a putty knife to really get it tight into the corners and edges.
 One thing that can not be said enough: YOU REALLY GOTTA KEEP PRESSING THE PAPER DOWN AS IT DRIES OR YOU'LL GET AIR BUBBLES UNDER THE PAPER.

 

I slapped some mod podge on the opposite side and carefully wrapped the paper over it, and again, pressed out all the air bubbles.












Once the sides were done I cut my pieces to fit in and on the bottom of the tray. These were made just a little bit smaller than the actual sizes needed, but big enough to cover the overlaps












Here's a close up of the texture.













On the inside of the trunk I had to work around the rails that hold the tray and the lid bracket. It doesn't look so good now, but once painted it won't be so noticeable.

Upcycle an Old Trunk, Part 1: Adding Feet To An Old Trunk

This is the trunk I'm working on. The fiber board on the outside was bubbled on the top so I had to tear it off. Not much to look at now, is it?   No fear. It'll be awesome by the time I'm done (I hope).

 

The first ting I did was to reinforce the bottom to give the feet something to hold on to. I cut two  pieces of pine board to fit inside the trunk.

 I put the pine in the trunk, glued it down, and nailed it in. Nail through the front and back of the trunk first then through the sides, so the pine doesn't move off the corner as you nail.

This is what I'm using for feet. They are actually pieces of a spindle from an antique bed that I got on the side of the road.

I placed them where I thought they looked good and marked the spot on the bottom of the trunk.
Then I made a template so I wouldn't have to do a lot of measuring for the other corners. Make sure your template is square and mark which are the front/back and which are the sides on both sides of the template as you will have to flip it over for 2 of the corners.

Mark the center and drill a hole for your bolt.
















That thing on the end of the bolt is called a wood insert nut. I use these to attach the feet. Mark the center of each of the feet and drill a hole just deep enough to accept the wood insert nut. Spin the other nut down to the wood insert nut to lock it in place, Slather some glue on the wood nut and screw it into the hole you made in the feet. Loosen the regular nut and unscrew the bolt.

  

   Drill a hole through the bottom on the mark you made, put a bolt through, and screw on the foot.