Grace Taormina, director of creative research and development for Rubber Stampede, shows how to turn plain wooden plates into decorative items with rubber-stamp painted images. Materials:
Unfinished wooden plates, trays or chargers
Fine-grit sandpaper
Acrylic paint for basecoat
Paintbrush
Rubber stamps: swirl, cherry and foliage, pear, grape cluster
Rubber-stamp ink or paint in your choice of colors
Wedge sponges
Fine detail paintbrush
Acrylic polyurethane sealer
Plastic plate
Optional: antiquing glaze
- Lightly sand the unfinished wooden plate.
- Apply a coat of acrylic paint to both sides of the plate and let dry.
- Pour a small amount of each of your chosen stamping colors onto a plastic plate. Using a separate wedge sponge for each color, apply stamping ink or paint to the rubber stamp, and press the stamp firmly in place on the wooden plate. Press down on all areas of the stamp to ensure a good impression. Lift the stamp and allow the stamped area to dry.
- When using a fruit stamp with foliage, for example, cherries on a stem, apply appropriate colors to each part of the stamp before stamping (figure A). Apply red paint or ink to the cherries and light green to the foliage. Give the foliage depth by adding a bit of darker green to the edges of the leaves.
- To print only the leaf portion of a stamp, clean the entire stamp thoroughly with water, then apply paint just to the foliage portion of the stamp.
- Add painted squiggles to the background or details to leaves or fruit with a fine detail brush (figure B).
- Protect the finished stamped wooden pieces with a coat of acrylic polyurethane.
- If desired, give the finished piece an aged look with a coat of antiquing glaze.
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