Lesson 2: Practice Run - Getting the Basics Down
Have you ever been to one of the old time really grand looking movie theaters from the 20s and 30s? Those amazing wall and ceiling designs are all stenciled. Some people use stencil patterns to create one of a kind wallpaper. And probably the most common use for stencils is to create a hand painted border or dado on the walls.
Some simply like to scatter a few surprises around the house. One of my own favorites is a little stenciled mouse peeping out of a mouse hole. Or a "hole" in the wall with fallen away plaster and a bit of ivy creeping through the cracks.
Window and doorframes can really get a lift with a flowering or leafy vine flowing around them. You can create a special look on ceilings by using decorative stencils at the corners, somewhat like the fancy ceilings in old mansions.
Or you can go whole hog and create a mural, complete with sky, birds, flowers, fences, and whatever else strikes your fancy. Turn a boring hallway into an exotic Casbah corridor or a summer garden. Hang a window frame on a blank wall over a stenciled summer scene to cheer yourself in winter. Create an outdoor scene on an inside door as though it were already open - a little fool the eye fun. The "Oriental rug" I stenciled on my dining room floor invariably has people lifting their feet so as not to trip - which inevitably brings smiles. I taught my husband how to stencil when we did that rug - which is entirely created from simple, inexpensive overlay stencils. In five minutes he was working on the actual floor. It can be that easy!
And then you can do wonderful things with smaller objects. Decorate furniture with a floral theme, or something very Art Deco and geometric. Imitate tile on a table top or even a door, as in the first photo on this page. Dress up that computer monitor and console to blend in better with your traditional décor. Take small picture frames and boxes and turn them into something special.
You can even create one of a kind clothing by buying something plain - a white t-shirt, or a plain dress or slacks,and using stencils and fabric paints to customize it.
Once you start to think about it, the possibilities for personalizing your home and your clothing with stencil designs is endless. I even stenciled my bathtub!
Stencils come in almost every style and design you can dream up, from Navajo rug patterns to life-sized Art Deco dancing women to basket weaves and metal grilles and almost everything in between. So whether your style is traditional, Victorian, exotic, ultra modern or eclectic, you can find many that will express the basic you - and it's so easy that once you've tried it on a few small projects you'll find your eye constantly roaming, looking for new things to personalize.
In this lesson we'll be practicing using a one color single overlay stencil. We'll begin by doing it in its most basic form, then move on to themes and variations that show you how versatile even this simplest stencil can be.
But first - your needed supplies and preparation.
Your Basic Supplies
To get a feel for stenciling we're going to do a simple project, using the simplest stencil available and requiring only a minimal investment in supplies. If you like what you get then we will explore all the alternatives available to you for even more spectacular effects in the next lesson.
To get started, you really only need a few simple materials. I recommend getting an old board, a box, or even blank paper to practice on at first. My own first "practice session" lasted about five minutes, before I was convinced that it was OK to go ahead and tackle the walls. Of course that was an extremely simple stencil!
To do a simple starting project you need the following supplies:
- Stencil
- Brushes
- Paint
- Practice surface (newspaper, cardboard, plain wrapping paper, etc. Ideally about 2' wide or more)
- Paper plate
- Paper towels - one dry, one damp
- Masking tape
- Pencil
Stencils
These supplies require a very minimal investment. If you want to simply get the feel for things, you can buy some truly inexpensive stencils at most crafts stores. Many cost only a dollar or two and are good for practicing on - and if you like, they can be used well in decorating projects afterward. If you've never done this before I recommend starting with one of these. For practice purposes I suggest getting one that forms a border design - one where you will have to line the stencil up repeatedly to get a long series of repeats that could form a wall border.
Brushes
You can also start with the least expensive stencil brushes the store has. As you get into it you may want to invest in higher quality brushes and other tools used to apply paint - but let's start small for now. The traditional stencil brush's bristles form a circle with a blunt end - as if the tip of a regular paintbrush had been cut off flush. They are usually white and fairly stiff. For now you can probably get by with one very small one and a medium sized one, unless the stencil you chose has some extremely large blank spots in need of filling.
Paints
As for paints - for starters I'd only buy one or two colors. The inexpensive stencils I mention are only a single overlay (one stencil with the complete design cut into it.) It can be used effectively with only a single color of paint although experienced stencilers can create multicolored patterns with them. There are very elaborate and very expensive stencils on the market, some costing over $100 and some having as many as 15 overlays - but those are for another lesson. And you may be surprised at how quickly that lesson will come.
You will find two kinds of paint at most crafts stores.
Liquid Acrylic Stencil Paints The most common type of stencil paint comes in little plastic bottles and is a liquid acrylic paints. These can be very inexpensive - often less than a dollar per jar. They dry quickly and clean up easily - but once they have cured they can be washed without fear. They create an opaque layer of paint on the wall, covering easily. The only possible drawback is that it can be tempting to load too much paint onto your brush, which can easily leak under the edges of the stencil creating blurry outlines.
That is one reason an almost dry brush is important - to avoid that leakage. Another reason in that when stenciling within a large cut out area you can create shading with the dry brush. Do the edges first for the most intense color, and as you head toward the center the color will fade until it almost disappears, which gives dimension to a basically flat area.
Stencil Creams The other type of paint commonly used is a cream, almost like paste shoe polish. This is a bit more transparent, and not as likely to leak under stencil edges, but I find that it takes more work to apply if you need relatively good coverage. I love this type of paint for creating shadows and highlights, though. So my arsenal of paints includes both.
The rest of the materials you probably already have around the house.
To get started, you really only need a few simple materials. I recommend getting an old board, a box, or even blank paper to practice on at first. My own first "practice session" lasted about five minutes, before I was convinced that it was OK to go ahead and tackle the walls.
My other materials were a couple of simple stencils from the crafts store, already cut from acrylic and ready to go, a few traditional stencil brushes - a large, medium and a very small one - and a couple bottles of acrylic paint. I used a paper plate to squeeze out a small amount of paint onto, and kept a paper towel handy because you need to actually blot most of the paint off of the brush before you begin to apply it. Most stenciling is done with a nearly dry brush. Masking tape helped me to hold the stencil in place so I had both my hands free. I also had a damp paper towel handy in order to quickly "erase" any mistakes I made, and a pencil to help mark the alignment of the stencil . And that was it.
These supplies require a very minimal investment. If you want to simply get the feel for things, you can buy some truly inexpensive stencils at most crafts stores. Many cost only a dollar or two and are good for practicing on - and if you like, they can be used well in decorating projects afterward. If you've never done this before I recommend starting with one of these. For practice purposes, I suggest getting one that forms a border design - one where you will have to line the stencil up repeatedly to get a long series of repeats that could form a wall border. such as these grapes - a good stencil for practicing using more than one color in a single stencil as well as lining up repeats.
You can also start with the least expensive stencil brushes the store has. As you get into it you may want to invest in higher quality brushes and other tools used to apply paint - but let's start small for now. The traditional stencil brush's bristles form a circle with a blunt end - as if the tip of a regular paintbrush had been cut off flush. They are usually white and fairly stiff. For now, you can probably get by with one very small one and a medium sized one, unless the stencil you chose has some extremely large blank spots in need of filling.
As for paints - for starters I'd only buy a few colors. But for practice's sake I'd get at least one stencil creme as well as some type of liquid or gel paint, just so you get the feel for each and can see which you prefer.
The inexpensive stencils I mention are only a single overlay (one stencil with the complete design cut into it.) It can be used effectively with only a single color of paint although experienced stencilers can create multicolored patterns with them. Notice one thing about this stencil - that when you have finished painting it there will be distinct gaps between the cat's body and tail - and that there is little detail - no whiskers, eyes, etc. The gap is called a bridge - an area that had to be left intact or else the stencil would fall apart, as would happen with the grape stencil above, or (as is the case with this cat's front leg) is there to create a necessary line. Now think about how you might have cut an eye or nose into this stencil? You can't, right? You may be able to add it as a hand painted detail, but in a single overlay stencil many small details are impossible to do.
There are very elaborate and very expensive stencils on the market, some costing over $100 and some having as many as 15 overlays - but those are for another lesson. And actually, once you have mastered two overlays you may find yourself surprisingly ready to take these on.
