Wooden Photo Plaques


For this project you'll need:
Wooden Plaques from a craft store (I got mine at Michael's)
Print outs of photos
Mod Podge and a foam brush to apply
Black Craft Paint and a brush to apply
Sandpaper for distressing
Hanging brackets



I started out with these inexpensive wooden plaques from Michaels.  I painted two coats of black craft paint right onto the wood.

Once the paint had dried, I was worried it was too flat looking, but then I remembered I would be applying Mod Podge, and stopped worrying about it. :)


I used some fine sandpaper to rough up the edges.  The photo below is from just a quick swipe of the edge. I had to work a little harder on the corners and any areas that were rough before I painted.


When they were all done, they looked pretty rustic, just like I wanted.  There isn't a whole lot you can do to mess this up.  If you take too much off, just repaint and try again.


Next I used a paper cutter to cut out photos that I printed out on some matte photo paper. I applied a black and white effect on the photos so they matched the black plaques. I used Word to print them out as my photo editing software only allows me to print the photos in standard photo sizes.  In Word 2010, the size of the photo is displayed in the ribbon (at the top of the page) while you adjust it.


After I cut the photos so they fit on the plaques with a little space around them, I glued them on with Mod Podge and applied a layer over top.  Since the Mod Podge creates a glossy finish, I applied the glue to the whole plaque. Unfortunately, the paper I used, bubbled up and created wrinkles.  If your paper does this...don't panic.  Let it dry all the way and most of the bubbles and wrinkles will disappear.  To diminish wrinkles, use as little glue as possible when first putting the pictures on the plaque.  The tricky part about this is that the less glue you use, the less you can move the photo when you put it down.


When the glue had dried, I put some hanging brackets on the back of the plaques...


...and picked out a place to hang them up.  Easy wall art for around $5--can't beat that!





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