wedding tutorial: order of the day
Another beautiful wedding craft which seems to be quite popular at the moment is the DIY painted pallette.
To keep the cost down for this one, you may be able to obtain a pallette from a local hardware store, if you ask kindly. I tried Tesco first but sadly they are no longer using wooden pallettes, and have replaced them with horrible bright blue plastic alternatives! I managed to get mine from Chandlers in Liverpool on Allerton Road, who kindly let me choose a couple, and delivered them for £5 (as they were too large to fit in my car).
We decided to cut the pallette in half, as there was no way I could deliver it to the wedding venue on the other side of the country without hiring a larger car. I also had the handiest helper to saw it in half for me (who then spent hours sanding it down to perfection).
You will need
Your chosen pallette
Ask at your local hardware store for any free pallettes they no longer need.
Saw (optional if you want to cut it in half.)
Pencil
Ruler
Rubber
Course Sandpaper
I used the ‘Norton Expert 40 coarse sandpaper sheet, pack of 3’ from B&Q; you can order it here). Ryan wrapped it around an old block of wood he found in the garage.
Waterproof fine liner pen
I used the Uni Ball waterproof fine liner with a 0.8 nib (which you can purchase here).
Black acrylic paint
Small paintbrush
What to do
When/if you are cutting your pallette in half, you will have to decide which side is more stable, some of the wood was damaged on one side of our pallette so it made the decision relatively easy. Ryan started by marking with a pencil where he wanted to saw (and it was a good idea because the pallette hadn’t actually been assembled equally, so as you can see in the photos the planks at the back are not straight meaning if he had simply followed the edge downwards, it would have been wonky.)
Once Ryan had halved the pallette, and sanded it down it was ready for me to start working on the wording.
The bride and groom jotted out on paper what they would like on each panel, and I pencilled it out first to see how it would look. Next I emboldened the words with pencil; if you thicken all the downstrokes it makes the font look professional.
I also free handed some flowers on two empty panels.
It is worth taking the time to draw out the preliminary pencil marks as you’ll be happier with the process when you have finished, without niggly errors to annoy. Once I was happy with the rough pencil marks, I went over the whole thing with the 0.8 nib fineliner pen. Where the wording was particularly narrow I coloured it partially in with the fineliner (so I wouldn’t mess up the thin lines with the paintbrush).
Next I simply painted what was left to be coloured in with the black acrylic paint, and Ryan finished up by varnishing the whole thing.
