Vintage Drafting Stool Upcycle

You may have seen some peeks of this project on Instagram over the past few weeks! A few years ago I got one of the old vintage drafting stools from my Dad's office clean out. It was grey and boring. ;-) I decided to freshen it up a bit!

Before

After!

First I spray painted the chair an aqua color. I masked off the seat and primed it with white paint.

I used Pixie Spray, a repositional adhesive for stencils, to tack down the Butterfly with Border stencil in the middle of the seat.

Next I started adding color! Blends 2 inks from Eileen Hull are vivid pigment inks that are permanent  when dry. I masked off parts of the stencil with post-it notes and used the blending stylus to easily add color just where I wanted it. When I was done with a section, I lifted the stencil and carefully used a heat tool to dry the ink. (I taped the stencil at the top so I could lift and replace it exactly were it was.)

After I had stenciled all the design, I decided outlining with a black permanent pen would really make the design pop.

I added several final coats of Krylon Crystal Clear spray over the finished artwork to protect it. I made sure to mask off the surrounding metal so the overspray wouldn't get on it.

My pretty stool is happily living in my craft room now! FYI, we just found out last week that Clearsnap, the manufacturer of Eileen's inks, is going out of business! Eileen put in a last order to stock up her etsy shop, so if you have been thinking about getting any of her inks don't delay! When they are gone, they are gone as far as we know.

Check out Eileen's blog and if you are not already a member, join the Facebook Eileen Hull Fan Club group. It is a warm, supportive group with lots of inspiration and sharing going on. You'll just have to answer a few simple questions when asking to join (to keep out spammers) and then you'll be added. ;-)

Supplies:

Eileen Hull Clearsnap Blends 2 inks - a whole bunch of colors!
Clearsnap Colorbox blending stylus with sponges
StencilGirl stencil - Butterfly with Border
StencilGirl stencil - Mod Ovals and Circles Small Stencil
Pixie Spray
Krylon Crystal Clear
heat gun
painter's tape

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