I love crafts. The joy of discovery always makes me happy, especially when it involves something I can somehow repurpose and give it new life as a different object.
For my sequined box or tray project, I took an empty box that had held occasional cards, acrylic paint, sequins and tacky glue and created a new storage holder for cards, pens, styli and even a mini address book! Now everything is at my fingertips for correspondence.
Step One:
Here’s my card box. Not only had it seen better days from use, it also had stains from a run in with grape water. But no matter how it looked in the beginning, it was the perfect item to be repurposed. Whenever I glue or paint, I like to place a towel under my working surface to protect it from any spills or unintended glue drops.
Step Two:
Stains are quickly covered with two coats of acrylic paint, liberally spread around by a craft paintbrush. I love acrylic paint for many reasons. First and foremost it’s nontoxic. It also creates a good water barrier should anything become wet. Thankfully it doesn’t take very long to dry, either. Allow about thirty minutes.
Step Three:
Now for the bling! Once the box is dry, I began creating rows of sequins to cover the sides. In this case, my box had diagonal orange and white stripes, but I like how the pattern blended with my various colors and shapes of sequins. I didn’t choose a pattern because I wanted the colors to be random, but any variation you like is wonderful! Let your creativity flow and make it in any way you wish. It helps me to put several dots of glue down at a time so I’m not constantly squeezing the glue bottle, putting it aside, applying a sequin and repeating. Spacing out multiple glue dots makes the project go faster and helps one concentrate on which sequins you want to apply.
Just keep going until each side is filled. Allow time for the glue to dry on each side, about thirty limited. It may still be wet or tacky, but the sequins should be affixed enough for you to lay the box on its side on top of the towel and continue to other sides.
It was important to me to achieve a uniform look on every side of the box, so I counted how many rows I made both across and down and was certain to match it on the opposite side of the box. I had seven rows down throughout, fourteen sequins in each row on the long sides and eleven on the short side. This will vary due to the size of the box and sequins.
Done!
A variation on the box is my sequined tray that I created from a perfume gift set box. It holds travel size and rollerball perfumes all in one convenient place.
Happy creativity! I know whatever you make will be fabulous! Have fun!
Etcetera 