vintage plate revival

As you might recall I’m into plates with animals on them at the moment. I kind off collect them, but they’re hard to find! So I made my own cat plate. Today I’m showing you something similar, this time two vintage plates get a whole new style!

I adore vintage plates, especially the ones with flowers on the edges, too pretty. Not to mention the gold lining that often occurs as well! I just love them. Sadly they rarely come in dinner sets, some plates broken through the years. They’re often sold alone or in pairs. I know a lot of people want matching dinner sets, but I’m not that picky! Mix and max is just as good, and much more personal. So when I found these two plates in the thrift store I had to get them (plates like these cost almost nothing at all). Then I thought I had to give them a make over to make them more interesting.

I thought a good long while about what i could paint on them to match the flowers. Then I thought of it! Bees! They like flowers, could be counted in the ‘animal’ category and they are super cute!

This is what you’ll need

• vintage flower plates
• gold sharpie (or any other water-resistant sharpie you might prefer)
• rubbing alcohol (to clean the plate)
• an oven

First of all, find you plates. Any flower plate will do, choose the ones you find the prettiest. In any thrift store you will find loads, I promise! They do not have to match, as mine do though.

Use the rubbing alcohol to clean your plate, finger prints and oil from you hands could disturb the sharpie pen from staying put. Just wipe it off a bit. Then take you pen and try it on a piece of paper first. This is important if you using the gold kind, they tend to ‘flow’ a bit more then the usual black sharpie pen. I found it much easier to paint the actual plate after making some sketches.

Start making you design! I had three bees on one and two on the other, but if you want you could try to make them symmetrical. When your pleased with the design and the bees are enjoying the florals it’s time to bake the plates. Set the oven to 175 degrees celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit) and bake them for half an hour. Let them cool. And your done! Easy, right?

Bee safe! (Yeah pun intended) xo Pella

easy to make, cat plate

I’m a sucker for anything with animals on it, we’re talking clothes, furniture (especially lamps!), iphone covers and over all nick nacks, but fondest might be plates. I collect them, I love to mix and match different plates al long as they are close to size! But since I fall in love with different plates in mostly every thrift shop I ever step in to I have to set up boundaries. The number one rule for my Odd Plate Collection is this: It hat to be an animal on it. And that is definitely harder to find then you think! I have a small collection already but I had not yet found a good cat plate. Since that was a big fall out in the collection it had to be fixed quickly. I decided to make my own.

 

This is the best craft for when you want to make a personal gift or only want to be creative for a hour or so. A really good one-afternoon-craft really. I bought a plain white plate at a thrift shop, they cost almost nothing, and I already had some porcelain paint and brushes at hand. Porcelain paint can be bought at any craft shop, it’s not that expensive, especially if you only pick one color as I have done in this example. They also last long and most of the paints can also be used on glass.

What you do is that you paint on your cat face, I choose to just make the nose, eyes, whiskers and ears. It’s easy and is a good thing to make with kids, inexpensive and rewarding. A good thing with porcelain painting is that you can just take some damp paper and wipe away any mistakes if your not satisfied with the outcome of one of the ears or something like that.

When you’re done with the painting you follow the instructions for the porcelain paint. It’s mostly baking the plate for half an hour and then letting it cool before use. I’ve already used mine three times, it’s my new favorite plate. I just might have to make a matching dog or something!