How To Get A Patina Look With Paint On A Metal Hanging Light?

How to pigment a shiny contumely light fixture to look similar it has an aged verdigris finish. This faux cease paint technique can hands be washed with inexpensive arts and crafts paints.

I finally did it! It has been a long fourth dimension since I terminal mentioned it, but the shiny contumely light that hangs over my kitchen island has a new wait.

I similar the expect of unique light fixtures, especially ones with age and graphic symbol and that have a fleck of green patina. Do you think the inexpensive-o contumely builder chandelier I aged with paint a few years ago?

I truly disliked the fixture, simply with no budget to purchase new, I experimented and painted it to wait old. I added strings of crystals and information technology has go 1 of my favorite DIY projects.

And then when I updated my kitchen cabinets last summertime with brushed nickel hardware, my shiny fifteen yr old polished brass calorie-free fixture needed an update. I decided to transform it with pigment to look like verdigris.

What is Verdigris?

ver-di-gris [vur-di-grees] noun

Verdigris is a green or blue patina that forms on copper, contumely or bronze surfaces exposed to the atmosphere fr long periods of fourth dimension, consisting principally of basic copper sulfate.

How to paint a-Verdigris-on-a-brass-light-fixture

Painting verdigris is easier than it looks.

Information technology is achieved by layering unlike colors of paint onto a surface.

How-to-age-metal-so-it-looks-like-Verdigris

Here are my inspiration photos I collected from tumblr, BH&M, and Traditional Home.

As you can run across verdigris can take on a few dissimilar hues – light to night greens.

I like the color of the square lights in the bottom photo and tried to accomplish that color for my kitchen island light. It is not too lite or dark and has a hint of copper showing through.

To paint the low-cal I used: white, light and medium shades of turquoise, emerald green, and metallic copper paint.

The process of painting verdigris is nada more than dabbing, brushing, and blotting a mixture of paint mixed with glaze onto the surface and then taking a pace dorsum to accept a await to make up one's mind where more or less color and texture is needed.

The actual painting time for transforming the light was about an hour. It took me a few days to complete information technology only considering I had to let it dry betwixt each coat.

How to Paint a False Verdigris Finish

Having a photo to keep equally a reference as yous pigment will assist guide you to get the color just right. Look closely at the layers on the slice in a photograph or a actual item to choose your colors.

How to paint a light fixture in an aged verdigris color

I could not create this effect without these 2 items, they are what make the pigment have on a translucent and layered look.

The showtime is clear glazing liquid. I constitute Simply Coat at my local Truthful Value Hardware. If you lot are non familiar with what a glaze is or does, here is the 101.

What is Clear Paint Coat?

Clear coat is a water-based medium that when mixed with paint creates a transparent paint. When glaze is mixed with pigment, not only does it add transparency to the paint, but too allows you more than time to move the paint effectually into crevices and detailed areas to attain a desired color look or stop.

How much paint in ratio to glaze in a mix will modify the transparency. More glaze = more transparency. Less glaze = more opaque. This is because it dries slowly. Glaze is not shiny by itself, but volition take on the sheen of the paint yous mix with it.

Natural-SEa-Sponges-used-to-paint-a-faux-verdigris-finish

The other detail that is needed when painting a verdigris finish is Natural Bounding main Sponges. Notation the plural in sponges. Most sponges are sold in a size that fits into the palm of your hand.

When painting a big surface like a wall in a fake finish, a big size sea sponge is fine to use.

When doing smaller items, smaller sized sea sponges are amend to use.

I like this pocketbook of modest sponges because to become a realistic look, y'all need to have many different textures and patterns. Using a few sea sponges will create a variety of pattern and shapes being applied.

If you use the aforementioned sponge and the same side of it when dabbing on paint, it will create the aforementioned look. Yous demand to create variation.

I sometimes rip the smaller sponges and apply the new ripped border to add another texture to the pieces I paint.

These are the steps I used to pigment the simulated verdigris, just no ii painted finishes will wait the same.

To get in wait realistic, you need to layer each color on to the surface and and then create a petty bit of texture with the bounding main sponge at the same time.

When working with a sea sponge to paint, wet it starting time, then wring information technology out. This will make the sponge pliable and ready to utilise to utilise paint.

supplies needed:

Paint – I used acrylic craft paints in the post-obit colors:
- White, Greenish Turquoise, Pale Turquoise, Medium Turquoise, Decor Arts in Plantation Green, Folk Art in Metallic Copper
Old splayed bristle paint castor
Small tipped paint brush
Mixing bowls
Spray bottle of water
Paint stirrer

I chose to work on my light while it was nevertheless hanging. It kept the project easier for me as I didn't need Ed, my electrician to take it down and replace information technology in one case I was washed. I placed painter's tape around the ceiling mount to protect the ceiling from paint.

i. Make clean the lite surface well to remove all grease and dust; let dry.

two. With a small-scale sea sponge or a castor, brush on or dab a glaze of medium green turquoise paint. Do non use coat. Let dry.

Tutorial-on-how-to-paint-a-fake-verdigris-finish-on-metal

three. In a mixing bowl, mix 1 part light turquoise pigment to 3 parts coat. Mix well. I afterwards transferred this mix to a divided tray so I could hold 2 colors in my hand as I worked.

How-to-paint-a-shiny-brass-light-fixture-in-a-Verdigris-aged-finish

4. In a modest basin, mix 3 tablespoons of water and one tablespoon of white pigment together.

Apply all over the surface of the calorie-free with a small-scale ocean sponge. (wet and wring out ocean sponge before using it, this will make it blot pigment) Permit it get drippy and bear witness the texture of the sponge. This drippy look mimics how rain would hit real verdigris. Let dry.

You can even use a spray bottle of h2o to spray the simply painted surface to make the paint/glaze drip a little.

5. Mix medium turquoise pigment and glaze together, Mix well. I used a ratio of most 50% each.

6. Apply the medium turquoise paint and glaze mixture with a sea sponge. Dab information technology all over, and so blot sponge on paper towel and go back to remove some of the paint. Keep doing this until you like what you see.

seven. Apply the light turquoise pigment and glaze mixture again. Repeat the application and dabbing off process as you did for previous layers/coats until yous like what you see. Let dry out.

how-to-paint-a-verdigris-aged-finish-on-brass

vii. Mix Plantation or an emerald green color and coat together – 1 tablespoon of each.

8. Wet sponge with water and wring out before dipping in paint. Utilize information technology to the light with a modest wet body of water sponge. Use dabs as well every bit just rub the sponge over the surface to create different textures to the layer of paint.

Let dry for near 5 minutes and then begin to dab some of it off. Blot sponge on paper towel and keep removing paint to betrayal the under layers of colour.

Remove more than or less depending on the overall color you are trying to achieve.

Information technology should look something like this later on you lot remove some of the emerald greenish. You can terminate correct here or if you want to add together the look of copper, follow the directions below.

Painting-verdigris-with-copper-craft-paint

ix. Dip a make clean damp bounding main sponge into metal copper paint. Dab information technology all over the surface of the low-cal, making sure to movement it as you dab so y'all don't dab the same sponge pattern all over.

Allow information technology dry for about 5 minutes then using a dry splayed bristle pigment brush, quickly and lightly brush it over the surface to remove some of the copper color.

Dab castor on paper towel a few times to remove the pigment, then go back and proceed lightly brushing over the surface until you similar what you come across.

Walk effectually it to brand sure you lot don't accept whatsoever blotches of solid colour anywhere, If you do, wet the paint brush to dilute the paint a chip and lightly dust over the surface again until y'all the blotch of color is blended in.

Information technology is OK to take colors heavier in some areas as this will brand it await more realistic.

If at any indicate you don't like the color, just add another layer of the color glaze/pigment you like over it. Dab it on, spray some water over the surface to mimic how rain would autumn on the surface.

I used almost 10 layers of paint – some very thin and transparent, others more opaque.

Hither is my newly transformed kitchen isle light. I did non seal it since I want information technology to wait a bit chalky, just like real verdigris.

If yous are thinking well-nigh painting verdigris or any blazon of painted terminate on an item, experiment offset on something yous no longer similar or pick upwards an item at the thrift store to try the paint technique on.

The biggest obstruction when painting anything to look existent, is ourselves – nosotros are our ain worst critics.

Take a step back and have someone else look at it. If they say – wow that looks and so real – your job is done!