EverBlooming: Toothbrush Cabinet

I am pretty excited about this little project. I have been seeing how people have been using different transfer mediums to transfer vintage images onto just about anything. So I recently invested in a couple different mediums to try them out. The Graphics Fairy's "12 Easy Steps to Image Transfer" has been very helpful in my education of these processes.

For this project I decided to use the Citra Solv Method on painted wood. I got most of my info on how to do this from "Our Adventures in Home Improvement"

Okay, so like most things, there is a learning curve. I had my husband print off a couple copies of this Vintage toothbrush image from The Graphics Fairy I had to alter it a bit to come up with the image below. the image needs to be backwards from how you want it to look on your piece.

Then I cut down the Photo copies to fit in the center panel and taped it down with painters tape.

So here is where things went terribly wrong. It says to adhere your copy with the ink side down (did that) and to brush a small amount of Citra Solv onto the back of the downward facing copy... well I did that or so I thought. I was using a sponge brush (probably my first mistake). So then I started rubbing the backside of the copy with, they suggest a spoon, I used a bone folder. And of coarse me being impatient as I am, I decided it wasn't working fast enough, so I put more Citra Solv on. BAD IDEA! Citra Solv is a major grease remover and I now know you could probably use it to strip furniture. Damn the copy started bleeding all over and the paint started bubbling and then adhered to the paper. So I had a HUGE mess on my hands.

So being the quick learner that I am (I have much practice from learning from my mistakes) I quickly cut of the part of the print out that I had not ruined and throw everything else away. (That stuff stinks) Then I scraped off the messed-up paint and sanded it a bit. Re-primed, repainted, re-aged.

While doing all this I thought about what I had done wrong.

A. this method is for unfinished wood, the solution gets soaked up and then you don't have the problems I did.

B. I put way too much on with the wrong type of brush.

C. the bone folder actually worked very well. (the only thing I did right)

Okay so lets try this again.

I salvaged some of my photo copy and thank goodness my husband had made more than one copy. (he must know me) I cut the toothbrushes into strip so that if I messed up again i would not ruin them all. I held one of the toothbrushes down and lined it up with the bottom of the panel. I then used a 1/2" or 1/4" wide painters brush and dipped it into the citra solv. I practicly wiped it dry before rubbing it on the backside of the photo copy. i worked in very small section, 1", so i could see what the reaction would be. then I scraped the back of the photo copy with the bone folder.

You can see below that at one point I got a little too much Citra Solv on the copy and the paint started to stick to again. it wasn't that bad and I thought it looked kind of cool, so I didn't fix it, but you REALLY can't put much solution on the copy when working with a painted surface.

Eleven toothbrushes, later I was done. I let it sit over night before sealing the image with Min-wax polyurethane. I was scared to touch the surface. Afraid the image would run. It was no problem though. I did try not to have to brush over my strokes much though just encase.