As promised a couple weeks ago I have a fun little tutorial here on making hand painted gold pillows! The “merry & bright” pillow was a new design I had added to my craft show in St Thomas this year and was bought by one of my Facebook followers. She had a great idea to add a second pillow with a deer head silhouette so as I was making it I snapped some pics of the process along the way. 

Supplies: muslin, gold acryllic paint, paintbrush, pencil, pillow form.

For fabric I used a natural muslin which I washed and ironed and cut to 15″×15″, (my pillow form was 14″×14″) I drew my design to scale on paper then drew it agin very lightly in pencil on the fabric. Mounting the fabric on a frame proved to be unnecessary so you can just skip that part! I thought it might wrinkle but it behaved itself beautifully.  I used a small brush to apply the gold paint and then waited for it to dry. (I picked up a tube of liquitex at the local art store for about $5. There were other more expensive brands there but I have found this one to work fine. Make sure to buy acrylic paint, it dries fast and has hardly any odor.)

I found I needed to apply a couple coats to really bring out the gold sheen but once dry it remained very pliable. I also found it looked best on light/white fabrics. The light bounced off the fabric and brought out the gold sparkle whereas the dark grey fabric I tested it on made the paint look dull and brown. I’ve been trying it out on white bunting too and I just love the look. 🙂

I’m thinking to make a couple pillows and some bunting for my own living room this Christmas, let me know if you have a chance to try it and how your projects turned out!