Although we’ve lived in our apartment for almost a year, I’m still trying to find ways to add character and to make it our own. Lately my energy has been focused on our bathroom- it’s white, ALL white! I’ve been looking for a piece of art to add some color to the walls, but haven’t found anything that fits our style. Then I came across this DIY Intersecting Circles Piece from Tristin & Company and loved the unique pattern. Since I’ve never been one to shy away from a DIY project, I thought this could become the perfect customizable artwork for our bathroom.
I do love Tristin & Company’s finished product, but I wanted to update it by adding some fun prints to mine. Instead of using paint chips like Tristin & Company did, I decided to use magazine clippings. I wanted to be able to bring some of my favorite patterns and pictures into the piece and I ended up loving how the final product! The magazine cutouts add the funk and humor I was missing in the original project.
Tristin & Company have great directions on their site, so I will just give you the cliff notes version.
First you need to make your football shaped template. It’s important to start with a circle that has the right diameter for your canvas. The key is to find the common denominator of the width and height of your blank canvas. I chose a 16×20 canvas, making the common denominator and the diameter of my circle 4. A compass is the best way to get the perfect sized circle, but if you are like me and haven’t seen one since middle school, you can go around measuring candles, vases, etc until you strike gold and find the right size.
To make your template:
1- fold your circle into quarters
2- cut two quarters out of the circle and face the curved edges toward each other
3- overlap the two quarters and trace along the curved edge to make a football shape
4- cut along the traced line and you have your football shaped template!
Next I got out my latest vogue and went to town cutting out footballs! Four football shapes are needed for each circle. Since my canvas was 16×20 inches (4 circles x 5 circles), I needed 80 football shaped magazine cutouts. Now you’re ready to start putting the pieces of the puzzle together. You will need your canvas, magazine cut outs, canvas and Mod Podge.
I started by LIGHTLY tracing the circles on the canvas to give me some guidance for placement. (If you look really close you can see my light blue tracings)
I suggest taking the placement circle by circle, lightly filling each circle tracing with Mod Podge, then placing the footballs exactly where you want them. Be careful, since magazine pages are so thin the footballs rip very easily once placed on Mod Podge.
After you fill your whole canvas with footballs, start your coats of Mod Podge! After 3-4 coats, you have a masterpiece! What I love most about this project is the ability to completely customize and have fun with it. Also, if you get bored it can quickly turn into a game of I SPY! 🙂
Each one of these footballs pack a ton of personality. I added pieces of some of my favorite brands’ advertisements, a picture of a building in Italy reminding me of our honeymoon and I even snuck Minnie Mouse in! This project took a lot of patience, but it was also a ton of fun!
