Tutorials – How do you learn best?

We’ll get to the 8 tutorials in just a minute, but first, did you know that when it comes to learning how to do things, we each have different learning styles? For me, I love to watch videos and read blog posts about DIY skills that I’d like to know more about. If you’ve ever heard of the VARK categories of learning styles, you’ll know that our learning usually falls into these types: Visual, Auditory, Read & Write, and Kinesthetic. There’s a great explanation here and for more on the topic, this book is a great resource. I think I also fall into the Kinesthetic style, where I love to learn in a “hands on” practical way with someone showing me exactly what to do. This is why I love teaching our workshops, for those who love the practical help! Being in the kind of business that is pretty much 100% visual – painting furniture – I have attempted to provide the best visual and explanatory tutorials that I can for my readers to learn.

8 Tutorials helpful for Furniture Painting

I thought today, I’d give you a few tutorials to feast on and glean from to help boost your furniture painting skills. Some are video based, others are visual & photographic within a blog post. Either way, I hope you have fun learning something new today! I’d love to hear what you found to be the most helpful, or useful in your DIY situation. Let me know in the comments. Just click on the headings to head straight to the tutorials you’re interested in.

1-3) Transferring Graphic Images to Furniture

This link actually takes you to not one, but THREE tutorials. One of my most common enquiries is how I transfer my graphics onto furniture. There are so many different ways of doing this these days, but in this link you’ll find three of the ways I’ve used in the past.

4) Creating a Farmhouse Barnwood look – layering paint

I love this method for creating a weathered look on wood pieces. I especially love using Miss Mustard Seed’s Milk Paint for this look, but you can use any chalk, Fusion or other furniture paint as a general principle.

5) Highlighting details with coloured wax

I love that we can choose from a variety of waxes these days, and you can change the whole look of a piece of furniture and even the colour of a painted piece by applying a wax to highlight the details. This tutorial will show you examples in principle using Miss Mustard Seed’s Antiquing Wax – a darkish brown wax, and Miss Mustard Seed’s White Wax. There are other coloured waxes available now and Homestead House’s Black Wax & Espresso Waxes are also popular! If you’re in Australia, we have these waxes available HERE.

6) Creating a Sea Swept or Fresco Patina to Age your piece

There’s actually a bonus couple of ways of using the Fresco medium in this tutorial link and there are endless possibilities with this fun product. For example, did you know you can also use Fresco to create a chalky type paint when mixed with Fusion Mineral Paint?

7) How to Stencil Like a Pro

If you, like many others, have been wondering how to stencil without the paint bleeding underneath the stencil in order to create neat, crisp lines. Well, here’s a tutorial for you.swirling stencilling

8) Stencilling using an embossing medium for a raised applique effect

So you want to create a stand out piece with some added detail? All you’ll need for this tutorial is a decorative stencil and some texture medium! Includes a detailed video tutorial.embossing paste

Need Help with your Creative Business?

Why not book in for a one-on-one workshop or “pick my brain” session where we can talk about your business needs. I’d love to help you with any of the topics I cover in the description of my one-on-one WORKSHOP link. [click the image below for more info]