Quick IKEA Clock Makeover

I just put up a new curtain in my kitchen and wanted to redo the clock that hangs above my kitchen window. So I grabbed this $1.99 clock from IKEA that was just sitting in my basement and got it ready for its makeover.

I couldn't figure out an easy way to take the clock apart, so I applied painters tape to the front of the clock and used my fingernail to crease it along the edge of the clear plastic clock face.

Then I grabbed a sharp utility knife and carefully cut the tape along the edge. There is a bit of a gap between the plastic body/frame of the clock and the clear plastic face, so I just placed my blade in that space and it cut pretty easily.

Next I grabbed a box that already had spray paint on it and went out to the patio.  I sprayed a very light first coat of Krylon Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint. It's better to be safe when spraying on plastic, you don't want it flaking off or scratching easily later, so the first coat won't cover the whole surface, just get the paint started so the rest of the coats will stick.  I let the first coat dry for 15 minutes or so and then came back and put a second coat on that covered most of the clock frame.  Then I let that dry about an hour before coming back and applying a 3rd coat to make sure every inch was evenly coated.  After the last coat was dry, we were good to go.

The oil rubbed bronze classes up a cheap clock pretty quickly.  It easily looks like an $8 clock now instead of a $2 clock. :) 

I hung it up above my kitchen window and it's a huge improvement over the blue plastic one that was hanging above the window before (I used to have a blue curtain on that window--it made sense at the time), and this one turned out so well I may give the oil rubbed bronze treatment to the blue clock too.