When All You Can Afford is Paint

by Dianna Wood

It is amazing what a little bit of paint can do to transform a room. And the beauty of using paint to decorate is that it doesn't cost an arm and a leg and; if you screw up, you can simply paint over it.
I came across a few photo's of projects that I did years ago when I was young enough to get up on a ladder and keep a steady hand.
I thought I would post them here simply for inspiration and encouragement. Several of them were done over 17 years ago. The images were painted directly on textured walls with no wall preparation required.
The first image was done with only one color of paint for the "painted on" shelf and the ceramic pots. The ferns were rendered with only two colors (green and paynes grey). The Iguana and monarch butterfly required a bit more work, but all and all this project took 4 hours from start to finish. The small butterfly shaped shadow on the wall really enhanced the three-dimensional quality of this painting to help "trick the eye".
(I apologize for the picture quality) The originals were Polaroid snap shots that had aged over time and this was as good as they get after scanning.

when all you can afford is paint, diy, flooring, painting, tile flooring

The picture below was my first attempt at painting a plywood sub-flooring. I glued foam rubber to a 12' X 12" ceramic tile and used it as a giant rubber stamp, mixing my colors directly on the foam rubber and then stamping the floor.

I painted the image on the back wall to appear as though there were French doors leading out to a garden room. Some major errors with perspective here, but it was my house and so I decided I could live with it.

I even got as bold as to do a life size reproduction of Da Vinci's Last Supper on a curved Dining room wall. It took 5 months and I would not recommend that large of a project unless someone is retired and has no children (or pets) in the home. My little Yorkshire Terrier pulled a cloth down that was holding a palette, ate some paint, and I almost lost him.