Inspirational Post ~ Make Your Own Rust Paint.

Hi everybody! It's Toni here and I'm going to show you how to make yourself some cheap as chips rust paint. So if you're thinking of entering our Let's Fake it Challenge, this could be just what you need to get started. I don't know about everyone out there, but I love shopping for new crafty goods. My budget, however, does not always stretch as far as I would like! This means that I am sometimes too precious with my goodies, tending to 'hoard', rather than 'use' them. This hit home when I found that some rather delicious paints I had hoarded, had in fact dried up when I came to use them. Not good, but entirely my own fault. So without further ado, here goes.......

I've read various recipes on the internet but this one works for me. It's not an exact science, so there is a certain amount of mixing and adding ingredients, to suit your own style or type of project you're working on. These are the ingredients I've used....

 Silver Sand
 PVA Glue
 All purpose Filler, cheapest you can get, for those in the UK, try Poundland
 Acrylic Paints in
 Yellow Ochre
 Raw Umber
 Red Oxide
 Raw Sienna
 Black
Once again, cheap paints work fine!

You will also need a palette knife for mixing  and some airtight containers for storing the rust paint.

I started by adding a good squeeze of PVA to a small container, followed by another good squeeze of filler compound.....

I mixed this up with my palette knife and then started adding sand, spoonful by spoonful, mixing each one in thoroughly. After mixing in about 5 spoonfuls of sand, I then added a generous squeeze of Raw Sienna paint. This thinned the mixture down, so I added more sand, spoon by spoon, until I had a nice grainy but spreadable texture.I was surprised by the amount of sand the mixture was able to absorb, so to ensure that it would actually stick to a surface, I added another dollop of PVA.  This little pot full, then became the base for all the other colours.

I got together a few small lidded containers and scooped out some of the base mixture into each pot I then added a squirt of a different colour, to each one. This is how they looked....

From the middle left, clockwise, Raw Sienna base colour,  Raw Umber added to base, Yellow Ochre added to base, Red Oxide added to base and finally a touch of black added to base. Use black sparingly, as it can completely overwhelm the base colour. I'm still amazed at how much rust paint I managed to get out of the original base pot. In order to see what the paint was like when it was dry, I painted some pieces of card with each colour. I was very pleased with the texture and also that it bonded really well to the surface without any grains of sand falling away. I also ran the cards through my embossing machine, and labelled them for future reference.

As I was very satisfied with the rust paints I'd created, I decided to use them to decorate a note book. This gave me the opportunity to try them out on a variety of different surfaces. The decorative elements I've used on the book include, fabric, card, chipboard, and metal. I applied the paint in a dabbing motion with a well used bristle brush. Here are some close ups ....

This is from the back cover.......

This is how it looks on metal....... 

and card........

This is the front cover with fabric collaged, then stencilled with modelling paste before applying the various colours of rust paint.

I hope you've enjoyed today's Inspiration Post. I would love it if you decided to give DIY rust paint a whirl and if you do, please feel free to share your results with us for our Let's Fake It Challenge, as I'd  love to see the results! Until next time, 'Happy Crafting' x