Rescued Fossil Table

A year ago we had to take some bits to our local dump and recycle centre. While we were there I notice a sturdy little table had been thrown into the huge metal general rubbish container. It looked like there was nothing wrong with it! Because the container was almost full, I could just reach it. So pulled it out, had a look and knew I could do something with it.

Finally, after a year of sitting around (along with so many other potential projects!), I got it out and started to play. Here's how it ended up!

And this is where it started.
Two of the edges had some damage so I used texture past to even them up (not shown here). Once dry I painted the whole table top with Chalky Finish Vintage.

I added a thick layer of Crackle Medium and let that dry overnight.

I painted over with Eternal Chalky Finish (white). The cracks were fantastic!

Using Andy Skinner's lush Fossil Stencil with DecoArt Modeling Paste, I added fossils over the top of the crackle, turning the stencil over to get the spiral going in different directions (beware some stencils are best only used one way up).  Again leaving to dry well.

Next, lots of layering with Media Fluid Acrylics. I love the translucency of these and watered all of them down to make washes of colour. Yellow Iron Oxide to start.

Prussian Blue Hue. And you can still hardly see the fossils!

Quinacridone Violet, and a teensy bit of Dioxazine Purple. The shapes are finally appearing.



I repeated layer after layer of colour washes, concentrating the darker colours (less diluted washes) around the fossils to make them stand out.

I added a mixture of the Yellow Iron Oxide, some Raw Umber and a tiny bit of the Quin Violet to give a rusty edge and dabs in a few areas.

At this point, once I was happy with the base colours, I added a layer of Decoart Soft Touch Varnish. That way I sealed the paints before going onto the next step - and it would make it easier to wipe off the next layer if I didn't like it!



And guess what? Yup, I didn't like the next step, hahaaa. Apologies for the pic, it was getting dark! I'd added White Antiquing Cream to make the fossils pop even more but I wasn't happy so wiped it off again but some still remained as just soooo many little crevices!

So then it got really interesting! I Popped the stencil back over each of the shapes, took a sponge dauber and lightly added a little bit of Extreme Sheen in Tin to the inside edges and Extreme Sheen Antique Bronze to the outside edges of the spiral fossil shape, blending after both colours were applied.




I Loved the effect when the light catches it! But still not finished!

To add a little more depth I went back to the Antiquing Cream, adding Carbon Black and Raw Umber (to soften the black) around the fossils. Left these to dry and wiped back, blending a little of the cream across the table,  getting rid of most of the white.

Getting there! 

The final steps to finish of this fab little table were to go back over the fossils through the stencil again, dabbing another three colours of metallic paints, in Splendid Gold, Oyster Pearl and my fav of all, the lush Copper. I added just the smallest amounts so that each section of the fossil would have a different blend of metallic colours and I didn't obliterate the metallic colours underneath.  Each bit looked different as the 'bones' caught the light.

A little more metallic around all the edges of the table and she's finished at last!

I really hope you like my little rescued tabletable! Here is a (not very good) pic of the products used. 

Drop me a comment if you have any 
questions.
Thanks for looking.
Suz
x