Tuesday, November 17, 2009

A trash receptacle made from trash? Whoa...

This project almost ended up a Craft Fail!

I tell you this went together SO easily in my mind. My friend Karen asked me to make her a little trash box out of an old, empty laundry box. Love the idea! It's nice and big AND it's all nicely scented for you AND it's free because you're reusing/recycling.

(I've been working on this project so long I took this photo at the last house I was house-sitting at!)
I guess you could leave it like that but what were those Gain people thinking? My retinas are scorching the longer I look at that box.

My idea was to cover it in this beautiful red paper and then do some black patterned things on it. Except the paper I chose turned out to be too thick and the edges would. not. stick. down. I tried multiple times with no success so in a bit of a temper I ripped all the paper off and then realized that what I had was a box that was completely covered in sticky, lumpy texture. I mentally slapped myself in the forehead. Now what? I was working in the kitchen so I started looking around desperately.

Hmm here's a stack of paper napkins. How about I decoupage those to the box and make it look like this whole texture thing was on purpose!

*evil genius laugh* No one will ever suspect this was totally on accident and completely out of desperation! I am soooooo clever. *snort*

*Hint: the more wrinkled and crinkled the better!



Now that my plan is on the right track I spray painted the whole thing black. Brown would be good, but I was out of that.

While waiting for the paint to dry, I layered some rectangles of paper to make a label for the front. (Yes, that is the Garfield ruler I've had since gradeschool. Like I'm going to get rid of a classic!)


This box is going on her washer in the laundry room so she has somewhere to put the dryer lint.


It's not just anyone who has a "black leather" lint garbage box!


It does kinda look like leather, don't you think?


I also painted a wooden candle cup to glue upside down to the top as a handle, but if you read my last post you know I'm going back and forth between two houses and there is a conga line of craft supplies strung along behind me and I'm not sure what house that part ended up in. It's not exactly necessary, but I think it might make it a little easier to open and it will add interest to the top.

Phew! Thank goodness I had a craft mentor who taught me that a problem or mess-up was just an opportunity to be creative!



Also linked to Trash to Treasure Tuesday over at Reinvented!

8 comments:

Jessica @ Decor Adventures said...

Oh my gosh, this is genius and looks amazing! I am so making one.

Patti @ Pandoras Box said...

very clever...no one would ever know that it was cardboard!

Anonymous said...

Very cute idea! Now if I just had some of these boxes! I used to get soap like this all the time but have started making my own soap sometime back so.....

great idea!

Donna said...

I have always used one of my boxes for trash, but never thought to redo it. Will be doing this for sure. Too cute!

Maggi said...

Awesome, you are a master! *curtsy*

Jennifer MacNeill said...

You ARE amazing:)

M.L. @ The House of Whimsy said...

Hi Molly,
This turned out GREAT!! There's always the issue of what to do with the lint, huh?
The house sitting photos below are spectacular. Lucky you.
And thanks for the link on the "toilet paper roll snowflakes". They're adorable. : )

Brittany said...

Ingenious!
It looks FAB!