How To Build Stain And Paint A Wood Sign
Learn everything you need to know to brand gorgeous DIY wood signs including the best materials to use, piece of cake ways to get perfect lettering, and how to frame your sign.
I have shared dozens of DIY wood signs here over the years and in that location are even more that never made information technology to the blog.
In fact, I used to have an Etsy store where I sold handmade wooden signs.
Merely with all of the signs I've made, somehow I haven't ever shared a complete beginning-to-finish tutorial with all of my best tips and tricks for making beautiful DIY wood signs.
So today I am sharing how to brand a fabled wood sign, including four ways to letter a sign perfectly and how to build a simple wood frame.
And in case yous are wondering, you absolutely do non take to own a Cricut or Silhouette or another cutting machine to make professional-looking signs.
All you really demand are a few inexpensive supplies and a bit of know-how.
This post contains affiliate links; encounter myfull disclosure here. This sign pattern and files are to be used for personal use simply – non for commercial purposes or resale.
Materials
The materials y'all demand will depend somewhat on which sign-painting method you lot cull, but this list will become you started.
- wood sign base – I like to make signs from plain 3/iv″ birch plywood. You can buy this pretty inexpensively at your local home improvement store. Arts and crafts stores as well sell lots of pre-cutting blank signs in all kinds of styles and sizes.
- paint for the background of your sign – Any pigment will piece of work for this including minor craft paints, paint samples, and chalk pigment.
- small foam pigment roller or a paintbrush – These are my favorite paintbrushes.
- stencil or a printout of your sign design
- Sharpie oil-based paint pens – These are one of my elevation tricks for making cute signs.
- 1″x2″ pino boards for making the wood frame
- forest stain for the frame
Tools
- hammer and finishing nails or a brad nailer
- miter saw or other saw for cutting woods frame pieces to size
How to make wooden signs
Choose your woods
My favorite sign-making cloth is basic birch plywood. It's inexpensive, has a shine surface, and can exist cut to whatever size you want.
You can buy birch plywood in ii'x2′ and 2'x4′ sheets at most home improvement stores.
If you lot want to make a smaller sign, yous tin usually have your plywood cutting to a smaller size while yous are in the store or you can do information technology yourself at dwelling house with a circular saw or table saw.
It may be really tempting to utilize thin i/4″ plywood for making signs. I used to do this all the time because it was cheaper and nobody would be able to come across how thick it was anyway.
Acquire from my mistakes – don't do information technology! The thin plywood warps very hands over fourth dimension and is likewise very hard to attach a frame to.
I highly recommend only using 3/four″ plywood for making forest signs.
If you don't desire to deal with cutting plywood, there are too all kinds of really cute blank signs you tin buy at craft stores.
You can purchase planked signs, framed signs, fifty-fifty signs in special shapes. I've linked some of my favorite styles below if you lot want to get that route.
Paint your sign
One time you've chosen the wood you are using for your sign, the next footstep is to paint information technology.
White is definitely the nearly popular colour for painted signs, but you tin can utilise any colour you want.
I've fabricated quite a few signs with colorful backgrounds that I really love. Y'all tin besides stain your sign instead of painting if you lot adopt.
A good paintbrush works just fine for painting signs or, if you lot are making a larger sign, you can utilize a pocket-size foam paint roller to speed things forth.
Lettering your sign
The next step is to add together the design to your sign. There are 4 main methods for lettering a wooden sign.
Stenciling a sign
One of the easiest ways to letter a gorgeous sign is to apply a stencil. Stencils are great considering anyone can get beautiful results even if you have terrible handwriting.
Stencils also eliminate the need to effigy out a great saying and design for your sign because they come already designed and prepare for sign-making.
home sugariness habitation stencil
If yous choose to stencil your sign, I have a post all about how to perfectly stencil wood signs and another postal service all about the unlike types of stencils for wood signs .
And I'm sharing some of my favorite stencils for woods signs beneath. Some of these stencil designs are really fantastic.
Favorite Stencils for Signs
Using a printed design for a sign
My personal favorite method is to impress out a pattern and transfer it onto your sign.
I dearest this method because yous have complete design control – your sign tin say anything you lot want in any font you lot like.
You tin can pattern exactly what yous desire your sign to look similar on your calculator using Canva , PicMonkey ,or even Microsoft Give-and-take.
So print information technology out and transfer it to your sign using a elementary pencil transfer technique. I accept step-by-pace instructions for doing a pencil transfer if you've never done it earlier. It really is incredibly like shooting fish in a barrel and requires zero design skill.
Making a sign with a vinyl cutting machine
In the past few years, Silhouettes and Cricuts have become very popular for sign-making. Both machines can cut designs out of adhesive vinyl that make for easy sign-making.
You can design your own sign or buy one of the hundreds of designs available on Etsy, cutting out the design with your Silhouette or Cricut, and so apply the vinyl letters similarly to how a stencil is used.
I don't typically use a cutting machine for sign-making, just Laura from The Turquoise Home has a groovy vinyl sign-making tutorial here .
Hand-lettering a sign
You lot can also paw-letter your sign if you have bully handwriting. I would recommend using a pencil to draw the initial letters and then you can erase any mistakes.
Paint your lettering
When y'all are transferring a design or manus-lettering, the accented all-time 'paint' to employ for painting the lettering on DIY signs is Sharpie oil-based pigment pens .
A paint pen also makes for like shooting fish in a barrel stenciling simply if you lot are making a vinyl sign, the process is a chip dissimilar.
If you have used paint pens before, yous probably accept realized that not all paint pens are equal. Some are a downright mess to endeavor to utilise.
I love the Sharpie oil-based ones considering they write smoothly, have good coverage, and write well on both stained and painted wood.
They aren't perfect, but they piece of work so much better than any other paint pens I take tried – specially if y'all are doing white lettering.
And using a paint pen is about 1000% easier than trying to pigment perfect letters with a tiny footling paintbrush. (I've used that method too and it is not my favorite!)
If you lot are hand-lettering or transferring a design to make your sign, y'all can use your paint pen to fill in the penciled design.
It's as like shooting fish in a barrel every bit coloring in a coloring volume.
If you are stenciling a sign, you tin only use a paint pen in place of paint to stencil your sign.
How to frame your sign
When I first started making wooden signs years ago, I never added a frame.
Honestly, I wasn't sure how and I idea they looked fine without a frame.
And they did. But I love how a simple wood frame makes a DIY sign look truly finished.
And it turns out framing a wood sign is really really piece of cake.
Yous need a 1″x2″ pine board for your frame. Cut two pieces the height of your wooden sign plus one.5 inches.
Cut 2 more pieces the width of your wooden sign.
Use 220 grit sandpaper to smooth whatever rough edges and then utilise a make clean material to stain your sign in the stain of your selection. (I used Minwax nighttime walnut for this frame.)
Once the stain has dried, lay your sign pieces out on a flat surface.
Use some forest glue and a hammer and finishing nails (or a brad nailer if you have ane) to adhere the peak and bottom frame pieces to the sign.
One blast in the center of each piece is enough for small signs; larger signs may demand a couple of nails.
Then attach the two side pieces to the sign using a pair of finishing nails in each corner.
The last step is to adhere a sawtooth picture hanger to the back for hanging.
Favorite DIY Wood Signs
At present that you know everything most making astonishing wood signs, I thought it would be helpful to share a fleck of sign inspiration.
Of the dozens of DIY wood signs I've fabricated, these are my favorites. Most of these signs have a tutorial linked beneath the photo, but at that place are a few that don't take full tutorials.
Almost of the tutorials also include either a link to the stencil I used or a printable version of the blueprint that you can print at home to make your ain sign.
 Sunshine Sign Tutorial |  Thankful Sign Tutorial |  Tutorial in my volume |
 Wise Sayings Sign Tutorial |  Fresh Air Sign Tutorial |  |
 Habitation Sign Tutorial |  Family Rules Sign Tutorial |  I'll Fly Away Sign Tutorial |
 Thankful Sign Tutorial |  Joy Sign Details |  |
I promise y'all feel completely prepared now to dive into making your own wood signs!
And if not, please ask any questions you may accept – I am always happy to help!
I'd dear for yous to share this post on Pinterest!
Source: https://www.lovelyetc.com/how-to-make-easy-diy-wood-signs/
Posted by: glassdiedich.blogspot.com
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