West Elm Knock Off - Striped Vases {For Less Than 1/10 the Price}

I found these striped vases on the West Elm website and was immediately in love.

They remind me of one of my favorite places - the beach! As much as I'd love to have them, shelling out nearly $150 for the set just wasn't happening.

So I did what any DIY-er would do and decided to make my own, and see just how much money I could save.

Of course my usual first course of action is to visit a thrift store and see what kind of material I can find to work with.

This trip did not disappoint and I found an entire shelf of would-be upscale vases just waiting for a little pampering to dress them up.

I settled on these four and with the 25% off sale of miscellaneous merchandise that day (win!), spent just $5.63.

Before painting them with craft paint, I hit them with a light coating of spray primer. I wanted a good gripping surface because I would be adding a little texture to the paint that would really make this project pop.

And that texture comes from sand.

Sand makes a huge difference in the finished look and transforms basic glass vases into textured pottery-like vases.

I add sand to a puddle of paint and blend with the brush, adding more sand or paint until I get a texture I like.

After the primer was dry, I brushed the sand-paint mixture onto all four of the vases. Some of the sand will drop off while you're painting - especially if you mix in a lot of sand like I did - but when the paint dries, the sand does not come off.

I totally love this because it really makes the vases look so much like heavy pottery.

Isn't that texture great? And it's nothing but basic play sand that you can buy from garden centers.

For the first vase, I used a little painters tape to add the second color.

But as I worked, I discovered that the flat craft brushes I used cut pretty straight lines on their own.

I used three shades of blue and a bright white to make the stripes on each vase, following the general pattern from the West Elm vases.

In the end, I had four knock off vases for $8.13 plus tax - a savings of over $135!

There's several close-up photos on the blog that really show off the texture of these vases. Stop by and visit and get your FREE Thrift Shopping Cheat Sheet that shares all 10 hacks I use to thrift shop like a PRO!

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