Our little bathroom has no storage and even less room for installing storage. We keep most of our bathroom supplies in the bedroom closet, but a few necessities get stashed in a basic drawer unit and stuck on top of the back of the toilet. Yeah we know, not the most clever and definitely not so pretty but super practical. We got sick of the dirty, ugly drawer unit (with random messy drops of paint) so we decided to take small steps to beautify...
We scooped up a few sheets of craft paper we had stashed away, an exacto blade and matte medium (we used Mod Podge). We took all the drawers out and got to work.
We didn't bother to measure, just cut up the paper as we went along, glued it on with the medium and then painted on an even layer of Mod Podge, making sure to cover all of the paper.
It took about an hour (we had some issues with the little finger cut-outs) and then another few hours to dry completely. So much nicer...looks a little bit more intentional and a lot less shabby art student cast-offs.
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I think it looks splendid!
view Hollie's profile
duh! Never thought to use FIRA in the bathroom. awesome idea! what did you end up doing for the finger-pull cut outs?
view selena's profile
I am always stuck for what paper to use - very indecisive. And every time I see a project like this, the paper choice seems inspired! Well done!
view deepa's profile
Did you cover the entire outside surface of the craft paper with the matte medium too?
And is the craft paper a normal weight, like normal copy machine paper?
Thanks! I'm asking because this looks great and I want to do it to a chest of drawers.
view SusieC's profile
Very cool! I've seen that paper at Michael's and loved it on the shelf...looks even better in action.
view I Love Upstate's profile
thanks for the kind comments folks.
selena- finger pull cut-outs...faked it as best as possible! then laid a "finishing" piece on top of the curve to hide the tears.
susiec- yes, i painted a layer over the entire surface wherever i had paper (i was lazy and the back remains paperless).
the craft paper was from martha stewart's craft line (clearance at michaels!). the link has info about the weight of the paper, etc.
view shayna r's profile
Love that unit! Where did you find it? WE need something like that. My husband is afraid to go into the bottom of the sick as it always attacks him.
view lilfrench's profile
That's a beautiful project, Shayna! I love how you worked with the design on the paper. I can't believe it only took you a couple of hours!
view Dani's profile
How about turning the drawers around so the cut-outs don't show and adding some cute little drawer pulls - will stop the paper getting dirty from fingers going into the cut-outs
view Violetsrose's profile
lilfrench- i bought mine years ago at an art supply store, but i've seen a variety of this type at ikea for much cheaper.
violetrose- that's a fantastic idea! unfortunately these drawers have kind of a fake back that wouldn't work so well, but i believe you could do that with the ikea version.
view shayna r's profile