Do-it-yourself dresser decoupage

Most often they get rid of old things, but what if, after renovation, you find that your favorite chest of drawers does not fit into the interior at all, and buying a new one is not at all in your plans? Then a fashionable technique will come to your aid - decoupage. With its help, you can, with a minimum of effort, create a spectacular stylish thing that will suit you.

Old Soviet-made dressers are distinguished by their classic design, impeccable quality and exquisite lines. Like any other furniture, over time they lose their presentable appearance - the paints fade, the varnish begins to exfoliate, cracks and scuffs appear. The decoupage technique, which is decorating with all kinds of paper and linen pictureswhich are often combined with special effects.

Many people think that decoupage is a French technique, but few people know that in fact, its homeland is the eastern part of Siberia. A little later, this technique came to the countries of the Old World. By the way, in Italy decoupage was considered “the creativity of the poor”, the direction received such a “nickname” because not everyone had the opportunity to decorate their home with precious stones, gold or silver, but everyone wanted to live in a beautiful house. Over time in France decoupage was elevated to the rank of art, then even the rich did not disdain to adornments of this kind in their homes.

Today, there are quite a few ways to restore the appearance of dressers - using paper and napkins, linen, aging by applying unexpected color combinations, imitation of cracking on the surface. Anyway the result will be consistently spectacular and luxurious.

The main advantage of technology is a highly artistic result, which can be achieved even in the absence of special education. This is achieved due to the main distinctive feature of decoupage - the application of a ready-made image to the base. For these purposes, there is a huge variety of options with beautiful drawings, namely:

• decoupage cards;
• the cloth;
• napkins;
• Photo;
• stencils;
• wallpaper;
• scrapbooking paper;
• newspaper clippings;
• pictures from magazines.

New styles, effects and devices are added every year - all this suggests that decoupage will be in demand for a long time.

Each stage of decoupage uses its own special materials and tools. They may differ depending on the type of surface to be treated.

In order to make the surface more smooth and textureduse a fairly wide range of tools.

You can paint the surface of the chest of drawers in a matter of minutes. In addition to acrylic compounds, in decoupage they often use water based enamels or the most common enamels, some craftsmen successfully apply gouache, tempera or pastel.

Before applying paint, the surface must be prepared by coating with a primer, it allows the paint to lay down more evenly and adhere more firmly to the substrate. Primers can be very different - based on putty, adhesives, acrylic varnishes, there are also universal primers that are suitable for all substrates. And you will also need alcohol to degrease the surface and putty to eliminate minor defects.

This is a very fashionable effect in recent years, which is widely used when performing decoupage. In this case, it is best to take acrylic paints that imitate a metallized coating, they are applied with the most common brush. In addition to metallic paints, pearlescent compositions, and super-adhesive thin foil, it is applied with a special glue.

Most often, special decoupage glue is used for gluing, although many people glue the picture to the base using PVA. However, it does not provide the desired leveling effect. The difference between the sloped surface and the base can be noticeable if a picture of dense material is used. In addition, some craftsmen glue the necessary fragments. office glue, glue stick and even egg white.

To create interesting decorative effects, use such special compositions as:

• patina of different shades;
• special varnishes for artificial aging;
• powder for applying eyeshadow;
• pastel;
• bulk gels;
• paint for ceramics;
• sequins, glitter;
• structural pastes.

In recent years, techniques for creating crackle effect. For the design of cracks on the surface, the set of materials is significantly limited - only water-based decorative varnishes.

In order for the created decor to last as long as possible, varnish is used. It can be a special varnish for decoupage or construction. It is applied in several layers until a perfectly flat surface is achieved. In addition, it creates a waterproof layer, protecting the chest of drawers from adverse external factors.

The choice of style for decoupage chest of drawers is limited only by your own imagination. For children, these can be images of any fairy-tale characters. Geometric patterns and lines are considered a universal option, but most often old chests of drawers are restored in the Provence style. A distinctive feature of furniture made in this style is the color palette - it is customary to design a chest of drawers in white, blue, olive and pale yellow shades, and lavender, sunflowers, olive branch and other symbols of Provence are used as decorative elements.

A little life hack: If you want your dresser to look original, apply a few splashes of lavender on it. If you complement them with lavender motif appliqués, the furniture will turn out to be truly stylish and unique. You can use a regular toothbrush to make beautiful droplets. It must be tough, because with soft villi, the spray will turn out to be uneven and too large.

When doing decoupage with your own hands at home, you must take into account all the rules for working with materials of different types. For example, working with smooth surfaces is significantly different from working with rough boards - here you need surface sanding, which will not only save your hands from splinters, but also make the surface smoother and more attractive.

Before starting the restoration of the chest of drawers, it must be remove all dirt, grease residues and old coating. After that, you should walk along the surface. sandpaper... The prepared base is covered with a layer of primer and painted, after which you can proceed to the most creative part of the work.

To achieve the desired stylish effect, it is necessary to age the coating. To do this, in some places (along the edges, in the corners or near the handles), an imitation of wear is created. It is best to take paints of two colors - the main background shade and a darker tone that will peek out from under it. The paint is applied step by step, following the following algorithm:

• first, the chest of drawers is completely painted with dark paint and allowed to dry;
• areas where it is planned to make an imitation of aging of the surface must be rubbed with wax or paraffin;
• then apply the main background color;
• very carefully, slightly pressing over the paraffin layer, with the help of fine-grained emery, a thin layer of paint of the main tone is removed;
• if desired, you can additionally use craquelure varnish, then after the composition dries, cracks form on the surface.

Most often, decoupage cards or napkins are used for restoration. The second option will be much cheaper, and if the result does not coincide with the expected, it will not be so offensive. Decoupage cards are more expensive they can be performed in three versions.

• With a picture printed on thick rice paperwhich has pronounced textured fibers. The option is good if the entire surface of the chest of drawers is completely decorated.
• On very thin rice paper - such pictures look very gentle, and the borders are almost invisible.As a rule, such decor is complemented with strokes of watercolor paints, which creates the effect of artistic painting.
• Plain layered paper cards - before use, it should be divided into separate layers. To do this, a layer of varnish is applied to the front side of the image and allowed to completely push it through, then the workpiece is lowered into water and carefully rolled all unnecessary from the inside out.

Regardless of the material used, the work includes the following steps:

• the image is carefully cut out;
• glue is applied to the reverse side and fixed on the surface of the chest of drawers;
• using a soft brush for painting, smooth out all wrinkles from the center to the edges, this can be done with a sponge or a very soft cloth;
• at the final stage, the product is covered with several layers of varnish at intervals of 1.5-3 hours until complete setting;
• after the last layer has dried, you need to give the product a few more days so that the image is fixed as tightly as possible.

The following video will tell you how to do the decoupage of a chest of drawers with your own hands.