The beauty of Milk Glass lies in its creamy, milk-like color, ultra-smooth texture, and over all elegance. It’s no wonder so many people pride their antique milk glass collections, and do a little “woop!” when they find something lying around in an old antique store or vintage home setting. It is, however, a challenge to find other pieces that complement this vase, or better yet, finding other pieces made out of milk glass. The solution, my dear friend? Do it yourself! Yes! By painting it yourself, you’ll be able to create a great project that makes use of all your creativity and what you do and don’t want your vase to look like. with a little patience, some paint drip, and a lot of milky color, you’re all set to conquer it! Let’s begin!
To begin, start off with a plain old glass jar that could use that beautiful creamy make over pronto. Give it the best make over ever by following this simple tutorial:
DIY LEVEL: BEGINNER
For this project, you’ll be needing the following materials:
- a clear glass vase in the size that you fancy
- some Gold acrylic or gold craft paint (for this project we used: 2 oz. Martha Stewart metallic gold acrylic paint for this larger sized vase
- some white latex paint
- toothpicks or foam brush (but these are optional)
Step 1: Apply drip paint into the inner portion of your vase’s rim
To get the beautiful creamy milk glass look, all paint should be applied to the inside of your glass vase. Start with the color of your choice, making it drip from the inside of your vase, like what we did here with our gold drip paint.
Next, squeeze out a generous amount of paint around the rim. The more you put in, the heavier it gets, and the weight of the paint is what makes it drip.
For vases with a lot of angles to it, we suggest you apply the paint on its rim, and at the top of every nook to get the best effect.
Step 2: Apply the excess paint all over the patchy surface
Now, with your excess paint, go over the bald patches of your vase with a foam brush or toothpick to distribute the gold paint nice and even. You’ll want a nice, solid drip style that will reflect nicely from outside of the vase.
Step 3: Watch the paint drip!
Take some time off to see your paint drip, checking if it’s going well, or if you need to re-apply or scrape some off as you go. Any mistakes you make can be fixed up once the paint is dry, this makes the scraping off a little easier. Applying too much paint will make it drip all the way down, when all you want is length up until the middle portion. In which case, try to do this process slowly, adding little by little. Again, all mistakes may be fixed up when it’s dry.
Step 4: wipe the rim
Clean up your vase, so it’s nice and smooth around the rim. Don’t worry about what the inside looks like, the main focus is how the paint registers from the outside.
Step 5: Let it dry
After making sure the paint is nice and opaque from the outside, set it aside to dry. Depending on the thickness of your paint, the drying time may vary. It could take a day or two to set.
Step 6: Remove unwanted paint drips
You can now remove the paint that’s settled at the bottom. Thick globs are easier to get rid of than thin streaks, so it’s best to leave them alone until fully dried.
Simply scrape them off with your finger nail!
Step 7: Add the main color of paint
Add the color to the bottom of your vase, making sure it’s enough to cover the portion of clear glass. No more, no less.
Swirl the glass around so you can really get the paint moving in the direction you want it to.
Turn the vase on its side, slowly working paint from bottom to top.It doesn’t need to be too think, just enough to appear opaque from outside. Clean up as you go along.
Step 8: Let it dry
Leave it to dry upside down. Check up on your vase every now and then, wiping off any excess drips.
step 9: Enjoy your new vase!
Good luck, and have fun!