DIY Chalk Paint - Mulch & Paint

Hello again friends!

I wanted to pop in today to give a quick tutorial on how to make your own chalk paint. I really like chalk paint because you can use it over most any surface without having to prep it in advance. A great benefit of making your own chalk paint is that you can easily create custom colored paint.

What I don’t like about chalk paint is the rough, scratchy feeling of a surface after painting with chalk paint. I see so many refurbished furniture for sale that has been painted with chalk paint but has this icky, unfinished texture…like touching a chalk board. (I will give you a few options to fix this!)

Let’s get started…

Here’s the dresser that I began with. It was in Trevor’s bedroom and I had planned to buy him a new dresser while updating his room during the One Room Challange–Boy’s Room Refresh.

I searched for a dresser in stores and online, but was having trouble finding a dresser that I liked. My favorite online find was this one from Wayfair. After a few weeks of debating, I realized that my favorite dresser was almost identical to what was already in the room except it was blue.

I was planning to donate the existing dresser anyway, so I decided to make an attempt to paint it and use it instead. It’s real wood and extremely heavy, too. I know for sure that my husband did not want to carry that thing down our stairs unless is was absolutely necessary. This also was a money-saving DIY that helped to keep the costs lower while redecorating Trevor’s bedroom.

I have made my own chalk paint before with good success. I was out of the blue paint (Sherwin Williams Salty Dog) that I used on Trevor’s wall. I went back to my local Sherwin Williams store and asked them to mix a quart of Salty Dog but make it 50% darker. Most of the time, I use flat paint for DIY chalk paint, but this time I got a satin finish.

To make the DIY chalk paint, I gathered the supplies:

Plaster of Paris

Paint (your choice of color)

Room temperature water

Bowl for mixing

Measuring Cup

Something to stir the paint with (I used a plastic knife)

Paint Brush

The formula is easy…3:1:1 3 parts paint to 1 part water to 1 part Plaster of Paris

I mixed 1/3 Cup of Plaster of Paris and 1/3 Cup of Water together and stirred until it was smooth.

I then added 1 Cup of paint and mixed it well.

Chalk paint dries very quickly so try to work in one area at a time and make long strokes as much as possible. I painted a little on the top of the dresser just for photography purposes…but after the photo, I painted from end to end on the top of the dresser. I let the brown show through slightly to give the color depth. My goal was for it to look like washed denim.

I only painted on one coat of the blue chalk paint. It was completely dry within 30 minutes. Once dried, it was rough to the touch. (Again, I hate the way dried chalk paint feels!)

There are two different ways that I remedy this…the first is to use a clear top coat. My favorite clear top coat is Dixie Belle Gator Hide. You can apply Gator Hide with a brush or sponge over chalk paint. Gator Hide is a water repellent, water based top coat.

My second method is to apply a wax coat over the chalk paint. You can choose a clear wax or a tinted one. Although I had the Salty Dog mixed 50% darker, I still wanted a little more depth/darkness to the piece so I chose a wax stain. You can see the difference in the painted surface once the wax was put on. Be sure to follow the directions on the can. Once the wax had dried, I used a clean, soft cloth to buff it. For this piece, I put a second layer of wax on the top of the dresser.