Archive for the ‘DIY’ Category

I am so super excited about a week long collaboration with the amazingly cool company JewelMint. In case you don’t know, JewelMint is your all access pass to the latest in cool  and affordable jewelry… Kate Bosworth and stylist Cher Coulter scour everything from vintage shops, runways and style blogs to come up with the coolest and latest in amazingly awesome jewelry.

You sign up, do a little “style diagnostic” and viola- your jewelry personality type is chosen and pieces are hand picked for you. And the best part is – its really affordable only $29.99 for each piece.

Sooo… You know I am super pumped that JewelMint and its sister company StyleMint asked me  to use some of their latest products in a few DIY’s, and of course, offer you, my dear, darling, beloved, never ever mean to me readers a few giveaways while we are at it!

In addition, Sketch42 readers will be able to purchase one JewelMint product for 50% off HERE with the promo code “SKETCH”!  I’m making some awesome pieces with the stuff they sent me! Cant wait to show you…

Looking forward to a week of fun with you all!

 

 

A few years ago, I took a ceramics class and I learned how to throw a few pots. Nothing crazy. I mostly made tiny little bowls, like this one.

I actually found throwing pots to be a very therapeutic and fun thing to do. But… the class was all the way downtown, during the evenings, and so I just did one 10 week session.

Anyhoo- this was one of the first little bowls I made. And I finished it, it a white matte paint… I’ve had this bowl, and the few others I made floating around the apartment for years. Well, yesterday I got the idea that this bowl needed balls attached to it. Black balls. So I busted out the clay I had on hand… yes I had modeling clay in my apartment ready to go. AND my home supply of paint (yes I keep some small tubes of paint at home for emergencies like these) and I made little balls of clay, let them harden, painted them black and then kind of mashed them onto the bowl. Jury is out on weather or not they will fall off when they dry completely. If they do, I’m prepared to glue them.

Side note: my husband thought I painted blueberries. I thought they looked more like poop.

Sooo, many of you will not be making your own bowl, but you could obviously do this with a store bought bowl. I am going to make a massive version of this very soon… wait and see.

In other DIY news, my painted orb is home and its a damn masterpiece…. if I do say so myself.

I usually like BIG things to make a big impact, but this little dude is packing plenty of punch for its size. (See the DIY HERE.)

I love how it plays off the painting near it:

Whoops, painting has no color in that picture.

I just got a new camera from el hubbo for Chanukah. Its a beauty too. The Fuji x 100. Amazing camera, but its hard to use and Im still figuring it out. I spent all weekend playing with it…it took me a REALLY long time to figure out how to take a single non blurry picture!

Anyway… have a great day everyone! Happy DIYing!

 

So yesterday, I showed you some walls I painted in black and white. Today I  made a sculpture/object/vase.

It was inspired by the ceramic sculptures I saw at the Elle Decor Showhouse in Miami by Reinaldo Sanguino. Obviously, I went in a little bit of a different direction here… but the idea of a painted orb somewhere in my house was not letting me rest.

Soooo:

In my dreams, paint dries instantly and I can take photos with this piece already in my apartment. In reality, this thing needs a good 2-3 days.

So…. blah blah blah. I like to put paint on stuff.

Hi, my name is Nicole, and Im a paint-aholic. What’s new with you?

 

While in Miami, I also hit up Design Miami, a sister fair, comprised mainly of furniture and housed in a tent across from Art Basel. I was OBSESSED with this gallery’s booth. So many good ideas here. 1. Cover everything in sheepskin.  2. That corner is amazing. Someone try that at home and let me know how it goes, will ya?

Cabinet by RAFAEL DE CÁRDENAS - HULK

RICKY CLIFTON Sofa and chairs. Inspired by Ancient Egyptian Campaign Furniture. 

RICKY CLIFTON - PAPER TILE WALLPAPER From Box Project

One Hundred and Twenty- five Sheets of Paper Tile Wallpaper Paper, Paint. ($2,500 EACH TILE!)

Learn more about the Johnson Trading Gallery HERE.

Photos by me, and via JohnsonTradingGallery.com

 

 

My friend Casey approached me with a little project idea. She has these gorgeous Miu Miu shoes, worn only a few times, and yet, because they were satin, they were pretty much destroyed in two wearings. She took them to the shoemaker to see what he could do, but he said it was a lost cause, he couldn’t clean em. So she had the brilliant idea of dying them.

No prob, I said. I love a good dye job. DUH. Am I not the go to girl for making a mess and attaining plumber-looking hands for the  next week or so? Yes, why yes I am.

I also had a pair of simple pointy toe pumps, literally older than my marriage, that had been destroyed by the streets of NYC. So, I picked up some RIT Dye, she brought over the shoes, we ordered in dinner and voila! New shoes for us both!

So this is what we did: You follow the package on the RIT dye for dying on a stove.(You can read them HERE too) You mix the packet with water, a tablespoon of detergent and a cup of salt. You let it simmer. At first, we painted and sponged on layers of dye onto the shoes, but when that just wasn’t doing it for us… it wasn’t covering the stains, we submerged them in the pot and went to eat dinner. Hence the “boil boil, toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble” photos!

20 minutes later we rinsed them off and repeated the process. (You can leave them with the dye on them for as long as you want. The longer you leave the color to sit, and the longer you leave the dye on the shoes before rinsing, the stronger the color will be.)

And there you have it! Giving old shoes new life with a little bit of dye. And also anticipated that less than 6″ pointy toe pumps will be in again. And soon.

For Casey’s green shoes we used a combination of Kelly Green, Teal and Denim Blue dye. For my red shoes we used Wine colored dye. You can see that my shoes still aren’t perfect. Methinks they need another round in the old witch’s cauldron….

Also, we had TONS of extra dye laying around… You know I can’t waste some good dye, so I took the opportunity to make a scarf. Stay tuned for the reveal in the next post!