Reader project: inspiring recycling with PlastiKote spray paint
We have been inspired by these projects from Ida of lemonbeedesigns – so nice to see her experimenting with different finishes from the PlastiKote spray paint range.
“I’m a stay at home mama to a two year old and a big time arts and crafts enthusiast. I love creating all sorts of things with my hands from hats to upcycled pieces of furniture. It’s my way of relaxing. I’m always on the look out for new materials and techniques to try. I’m relatively new to spray paints but have found them wonderfully easy to use. I like using a paintbrush with furniture, but when it comes to finer details, spray paints are definitely the thing to use.
I used Plastikote Twist & Spray Satin in Pistachio for upcycling the backrest of a broken Ikea daybed.
I used Plastikote Metallic in Graphite to give my birdcage a sleek new look.
This is a cheap plastic frame from Wilko (£5.50), cast into this shape to look like separate photo frames stuck together. It’s very light but sturdy and with proper glass panes. I used a primer, followed by PlastiKote Silver Glitter.
I love how easy the spray paint was to apply and how smooth and solid the finish was. I also like how these projects only used up one can of paint.”
We love these projects and enjoyed the diverse mix of ideas. If you’d like to see more, take a look at her Instagram and blog pages.
For more information and inspiration from PlastiKote, visit our website here.
Top tip: Christmas tree makeover with PlastiKote spray paint
Artificial or real Christmas trees – where do you stand? It’s all down to personal choice and budget. However, when it comes to disposing of the trees, the obvious choice is real as it can be mulched and nobody wants to add to landfill with more plastic. But if you already have an artificial tree and have fallen out of love with it, why not give it a makeover?
This gold tree looked good but didn’t fit in with the new Christmas theme. It was sprayed with PlastiKote spray paint in Black (from the Twist & Spray or Super range) to give it a new lease of life.
Inspired by this makeover, two more stylish looks were achieved by spraying it again…and again!
Gold trimmings interspersed with red and white decorations work well with the red tree.
Silver decs, pale pink baubles and fluffy feathers give this pink tree a feminine charm.
Why not update your Christmas theme and recycle your artificial Christmas tree?
Follow us on Instagram @plastikoteuk for more ideas and projects.
For product information, visit the website www.plastikote.co.uk.
Competition: WIN a £50 Etsy voucher with PlastiKote spray paint
Fancy a treat? Enter our easy competition for your chance to win a £50 Etsy gift voucher.
Just tell us your favourite Christmas theme – A Natural, B Colourful, C Traditional or D Scandi.
To enter this month’s competition, just email us your favourite – A, B, C or D – together with your name, address and phone number to competition@spraypaintideas.co.uk and put NOV COMP as the subject. We’ll pick one lucky winner at random after the closing date of 30th November. Good luck!
We run a competition every month and entrants’ email addresses are added to our database to receive our monthly newsletter. If you wish to enter our competition but do not want to receive the monthly newsletter, please state NO MARKETING in your email.
Thank you to everyone who entered our October competition. Our congratulations to Coralie Noakes from Dorset who chose Copper as her favourite pumpkin colour. A £50 Hobbycraft gift card is winging its way to Coralie.
For the terms and conditions of our November competition, click here.
Want to know more about PlastiKote spray paint? Visit our website here for more information and lots of inspirational ideas
How to: Halloween decoration with PlastiKote spray paint
Halloween is big business with costumes, decorations and spooky treats filling the shelves at this time of year. If you want to join the fun but are on a budget, get creative with a can of PlastiKote spray paint. One can of PlastiKote Twist & Spray paint in Black Matt or Satin would be enough to do all of these projects!
Recycle an old wreath – spray it black and then be creative with the decoration. We stuck on fluorescent BOO but you could twist toy snakes around it, hang bats or spiders from it, even stick bits of old dolls to it – macabre!
A plain door mat has had a Halloween message sprayed on using a stencil made from a cereal box.
Using newspaper and masking tape to define the features, spray faces on pumpkins for a twist on the traditional jack o’ lantern.
Spray some twigs in black, push them into a pumpkin and use a bat stencil to make some paper bats to hang from the twigs. Use the stencil to spray a bat shape on the pumpkin.
Hopefully, we’ve inspired you to have a go. Share your ideas with us on Facebook or Instagram #plastikoteuk – we’d love to see them.
For more Halloween inspiration, check out our Pinterest page.
Reader project: colourful Quidditch with PlastiKote spray paint
Quidditch is a team sport in real life – who knew? We happened upon Megan’s Instagram page – thebroomcupboard – and saw her fabulous, customised broomsticks for Quidditch players, made using PlastiKote spray paint. Having Googled real-life Quidditch, we were fascinated by this team sport – looks like great fun and good to see mixed teams playing.
Megan loves the sport and explains how she decorates the broomsticks:
“So, I probably should start by saying in Quidditch we use PVC pipes instead of brooms in the traditional sense. I know its disappointing, we don’t fly either. However, it does mean they’re easy to custom paint.
After making the broom, I draw the design on paper, tape it to the pipe and engrave it on with a Stanley knife. After it’s engraved, I put PVA glue on the sections I don’t want paint on, then when the PVA glue dries I spray paint over it with PlastiKote.
The paint dries on top of the glue so I can just peel it off leaving the underneath untouched. The glue also doesn’t strip pre-existing paint so I can layer my designs with lots of different colours. If I need to do small sections, I PVA the immediate area around the design, then use electrical tape to layer paper around the design.
After the design is done, the brooms get a top coat and are left to dry before they’re posted off to their new owner.
Quidditch is a full-contact sport and we play in all weathers so the paint needs to be very durable.
My first broom has been to several muddy tournaments, twice-weekly training sessions and carted all around the country and it’s still going strong. I still have my first spray can as well, the pigment in PlastiKote is so strong that I only really need two layers, even on black PVC.”
We love Megan’s designs and hope her ‘thank you’ gift for sharing her project with us – some PlastiKote spray paints – come in handy for future broomsticks!
If you’d like to see more of her work, take a look at her Instagram and Facebook pages.
For more information and inspiration from PlastiKote, visit our website here.
Top tip: long-lasting pumpkins with PlastiKote spray paint
Traditional jack o’ lantern pumpkins look fabulous with their scary Halloween faces (Fascinating fact – did you know that the original jack o’lantern was not a pumpkin? The tradition was introduced to America by the Irish but pumpkins did not exist in Ireland – they carved turnips!).
If you have a look at our ‘How To’ section this month, you’ll see how we created faces on our pumpkins with PlastiKote spray paint – not particularly scary but you get the idea!
For a more stylish decoration that will take you from October through to Christmas, pick up unusual pumpkins, squashes and gourds from your grocer and spray with Clear Sealer.
Thoroughly covered, the pumpkins will be sealed and shouldn’t decay for a good few weeks. These were done in mid-October and were dispensed with to make way for Christmas decorations in December.
They look stunning layered up in a rustic basket or as a centrepiece for an autumn dinner party.
Follow us on Instagram @plastikoteuk for more ideas and projects.
For product information, visit the website www.plastikote.co.uk.
Competition: win a £50 Hobbycraft gift card with PlastiKote spray paint
Enter our easy competition for your chance to win a £50 gift card to spend in Hobbycraft.
Pimp up a pumpkin with PlastiKote spray paint! It’s so quick and easy to do and you can match your pumpkins to your décor. Metallics work well with autumnal colours. Which of these would look good in your home?
To enter this month’s competition, just email your choice of colour – Chrome, Gold Leaf or Copper – together with your name, address and phone number to competition@spraypaintideas.co.uk and put OCT COMP as the subject. We’ll pick one lucky winner at random after the closing date of 31st October. Good luck!
We run a competition every month and entrants’ email addresses are added to our database to receive our monthly newsletter. If you wish to enter our competition but do not want to receive the monthly newsletter, please state NO MARKETING in your email.
Thank you to everyone who entered our September competition. Our congratulations to Laura from Inverness who chose the Stone Effect bottle upcycle as her favourite. Laura will receive a £50 gift card for Ikea.
For the terms and conditions of our October competition, click here.
Want to know more about PlastiKote spray paint? Visit our website here for more information and lots of inspirational ideas!
Reader project: Naomi gets crafty with PlastiKote spray paint
Naomi (@gnowme) got in touch to show us her crafty make for a back to school project. She is a teacher and wanted to organise her resources into the days that she needed them. The box files she had were a bit boring so here she explains how she came to use PlastiKote spray paint for the first time and what she thinks of it!
“I haven’t used Plastikote before but I noticed it in the shop when looking for a tin of paint. I would have also needed to buy brushes to go with the paint so I decided a couple of cans of Plastikote would be better value for money and more fun to use!
To test the paint, I sprayed an empty glass moisturiser pot to make a little paperclip pot for my desk – the finish was perfectly smooth and glossy after just one coat of the spray.
When starting the files, I found that the first 2 layers were absorbed into the wood very quickly but by the third layer, the surface started to look and feel nice and smooth (I’ve since learnt that it is best to prime bare wood to stop the colour soaking in!).
Next, I used a permanent marker pen to bubble write the days of the week and decorate. To finish, I glued little lino printed paper stars on to decorate and I sprayed the folders with a clear glossy Plastikote to fix the pen and paper stars and give the files an even smoother finish.
I was impressed with how easy it was to get a smooth finish and the coverage was super – nice and even with no gaps anywhere. They were not messy at all and dried very quickly without a lingering paint smell.”
It seems we have another fan and hope Naomi enjoys using her ‘thank you’ gift for sharing her project with us – some more PlastiKote spray paints!
For more information and inspiration, visit our website here.
