DIY String Art

I am not crafty. Hand me a drill and I'll build you a house, but give me a glue gun and I'll probably burn it down. Consequently, I only attempt crafty projects that are straightforward to do and pack a big punch. That's why my DIY sunburst mirror was a perfect crafty project for me. I did it while watching a movie and it makes a huge (literally) statement.

So when I started coming across string art on pinterest I thought I might give it a shot. A piece of plywood, some nails, a little string and you have art. Wally. Sounds like a good project for me. And when I heard about the Young House Love pinterest challenge I finally got a push to get it done.

Here are my inspiration pictures.

enderbynest.blogspot.com via pinterest

eliseblaha.typepad.com via pinterest

I love the bold graphic of the red circle and the high contrast of the ampersand, so I decided to combine them. Here was my end result.

Ta-da! It's so retro! I love it.

So here's how I did it. First, I gathered up all of my supplies and brought in Nemo to play Vanna for me.

See that face? He has no respect for my artistic endeavors.

Supplies:
12" square 1/2 inch plywood
yarn
nails & hammer
stain & rag
measuring tape
pencil

The first thing I did was mark my circle. I used the tried and true pencil-on-a-string method.



I figured out where my nails would go by making a mark every half inch around the circle.



Then I went around the circle and made my holes for each nail.





Then I stained my piece of plywood with Minwax dark walnut stain.



You can see how my holes are really easy to see after the stain was dry.

Here's a tip: learn from my mistakes! First I tried to do this project by staining the plywood first and then marking my circle and holes for the nails. What I didn't take into account though was that I couldn't see my pencil marks on the stained plywood. Doh! Since I couldn't see my circle or my marks, I ended up starting over on the other side of my plywood, this time making the circle and holes first. It worked out much better.

I hammered each nail into the holes I had already made. I used 1" wire nails from Home Depot. They were about $1. (If I had to do it over again though, I think I'd get 3/4" nails instead.)



It's like a weird mini-Stonehenge

Once I had a circle of nails, it was time to start winding some string around. I started by tying my yarn around the first nail (don't worry about the tail, I snipped it off later).



Then I pulled the yarn across the circle to another nail. There's no special trick to deciding which nail to go to, just do what you like. Remember though, if the nails you choose are closer together your circle will be thinner, and if they're farther apart it will be thicker.

Once you've decided how far apart you want your nails to be, loop your string back around to the first nail. Then loop your string to the nail directly to the left, and then pull it all the way across to the nail to the right of the first "opposite" nail. Then back again, repeating that all the way around the circle.

If that doesn't make sense maybe pictures will help:



Chanting "out, back, around, next" seemed to help me too.

You can see the pattern taking shape really quickly. And luckily, it doesn't take too much time to do something this size so you can experiment a little with how you loop the yarn.



Keep looping all the way around the perimeter of your circle until you've looped around each nail and knot it off at the end.

Once you've done that, Wally! You're done! You've have an awesome piece of unique art to hang.







I'm really happy with how it turned out. It was inexpensive and easy to do too. I don't quite have a place for it yet though so it's currently homeless. I have big plans for a gallery art+photo wall in the future and I'm sure this will go up there once I get started on that. For now though it'll probably migrate from room to room with me so I can admire my handy work.





p.s. As usual I'll be linking this project up to a bunch of great parties, including the Young House Love Pinterest Challenge. Make sure you check them all out in my sidebar.