I really wanted a DIY faux aged mirror to hang on the old door that had the look of mercury glass. , I didn’t want to spend a lot of money and I had some thrift store frames and decided to experiment. It’s super easy to make a faux antique mirror from a picture frame and all of the steps are listed below!
Why Make A Faux Old Mirror From New Glass?
Old mirrors, especially antique mirrors can be made up of things like mercury and other silvering chemicals which are a health and environmental hazard. By creating a new mirror to look old it removes the unknown of what you are actually touching on the back of the mirror to distress it. Plus, it can be way cheaper than buying an actual vintage/antique mirror.
Supplies To Make A Faux Aged Mirror:
To create this a faux aged mirror, you’ll need: A thrift store or dollar store frame with the glass inside, Mercury glass spray paint, flat black spray paint, aluminum foil
Prep The Glass And Spray With Black Spray Paint
To start giving plain glass and old mirror look, leave the glass in place and clean the glass with glass cleaner so all of the dirt and any oils are removed. Make sure to clean it especially after handing it, or the oils in your skin can transfer to the glass, and your fingerprints may show up in the spray paint. When spraying the frame, make sure the backside is facing up, and the front is down. You’ll be spraying on the back side of the glass. Using a sweeping motion, lightly spray the glass around the edges with the black spray paint. This will give the edges of the mirror a patina’d look. You want this to be a really light misting of black spray paint. The more uneven it is, the better it is.
Apply A Coating Of Mercury Glass Spray
To create faux mercury glass with craft paint and silver leaf, see this post on how to make faux mercury glass with silver leafing
Add Aluminum Foil To The Back
Once the paint is completely dry, carefully add a layer of aluminum foil to the back as a mirror “backing.” with out putting pressure on the glass to avoid breakage. This will fill in any gaps that the mercury glass paint didn’t cover. At this point, I replaced the cardboard back of the frame to cover it up, and hung a boxwood wreath on the top to decorate it!
This is a fun and easy DIY to do with your thrift store (or new !) frames. Dollar store or thrift store frames can make creating a DIY faux aged mirror very affordable! Enough that you could make a statement wall out of dollar store mirrors!
*This was posted Via Jennifer Rizzo. com
