This is my first official post in this community and I'm going to start with a project that was quite unpretentious, but which ended up being very successful on my social networks (and that surprised me a lot).
I was going to put an empty liquid soap container in the recycling garbage and then literally halfway to the garbage can I thought: "what if I painted this container and used it to put shampoo in, for example?"
It blew my mind and I saved the plastic container to paint later. I imagined that if it looked nice and my idea worked, it would be much nicer to fill it with shampoo or conditioner. That way they would have a function, but would also be decorative in my bathroom. And it would certainly make me have fewer ugly containers in the shower stal.
I gathered some paints and thought about what colors I could use to match the bottle cap, which was already pink. I had no plans to paint the lid, as it would be the place I would handle the most, so I wanted to leave it free.
Colors chosen, it was time to start thinking about a design to print on the bottle. But before the design, I used a pink paint similar to the color of the lid to give the base color of the bottle. I applied two coats of this paint and only continued the process once it was completely dry.
I came up with the idea of a duck and sketched it out in a notebook, just to see if I would be able to draw one on the bottle. My duck looked like a pigeon and I realized that for it to have its whole body on the package, it would have to be a small size. So I decided not to draw the body and leave the figure of the duck up to the neck, as if it were a portrait.
Before venturing to draw the duck on the jar, I made a kind of frame with yellow paint, so that he would be positioned in the middle of it. I used graphite pencils to sketch the frame and then filled it in with the yellow paint. All the paints I used for this project are acrylic and suitable for crafting.
When it came time to fill in the yellow paint, I let the brush slip a little and cover the pencil marks, causing the frame to lose a little of its shape. But then, when everything was dry, I went back with a very fine-tipped brush and corrected everything.
I drew the duck in pencil and repeated the process of filling it in with acrylic paint, again with a very delicate brush. To make the details of the eye, beak and collar I used an even smaller brush, as I couldn't risk smudging the paint in this part.
It was delightful and very satisfying to paint this little project.
When I had finished the duck, I thought the packaging still needed a few elements and I made small leaves both inside the frame and outside its edges. For this part I painted directly on the brush, without any pencil sketching, and fortunately everything worked out.
After I had finished the design, there was a crucial stage, which was to waterproof the piece. I used shellac and two coats, but I think craft varnish would work just as well.
I took this precaution because the bottle would be in my bathroom and would come into contact with the water from the shower. So I had to protect the paint very well.
When I finished, I thought the jar was so cute that I could really see it becoming a vase and receiving some flowers, but I kept to my initial idea of keeping it in the bathroom and it turned out to be quite fun to take a shower looking at it on the shelf.
I hope you've enjoyed this project and that it inspires you to reuse packaging around the house to give it a new purpose.
See ya. 🦆