I knocked another item off of my to-do list from earlier this summer. You may remember the floorcloth I painted for my sister last Christmas. When I bought the canvas for that project, I ended up with enough to make three of the size I made Andrea’s. I figured that I’d do something with the extra eventually, but I haven’t touched it since last December. A few weeks ago I decided to stop procrastinating and start working on a welcome mat-sized floorcloth for myself.
Jessica from How About Orange had just announced some new, beautiful fabric designs at the time I was staring at newly bound and primed floorcloth waiting for inspiration to strike. If you can’t tell, I loved the rectangle and dot pattern of her “Boardwalk” print, so I set out to create my own design inspired by her fabulous fabric.
After painting a couple of these now, I can see why people can charge so much for them. A quick ebay search had them priced anywhere from $50 to over $800. I’ve seen small welcome mats in shops for over $100. If I were to sell this one, which measures about 22″ wide by 46″ long, and charge for my time, I’d have to sell it for a million dollars.
One night I spent several hours measuring, cutting, ironing, and binding it. The next night I spent about three hours priming it with four coats of paint. The next night I laid out the design which took another couple of hours. Then a week of painting every night, six coats of polyurethane, and you’ve got yourself a serious labor of love.
I do love the way it came out, and once Luke will allow himself to actually step on it, I think it’ll make a great welcome mat. I was considering making a couple more of these small rugs for Christmas presents, I guess I better get a move on.
Tags: floor cloth, floorcloth
How could anybody every step on it???? I still can’t believe you painted it. It’s so darn perfect. You make me sick.
Wow, this is really well done! Of course, if you sell them, the millions you make will end up in my pocket because the design is copyrighted
. You did a beautiful job; I agree with Paula above: who could bring themselves to step on it? It’s too nice!!
Don’t worry Jessica, after all that work, I’d never sell this one and I wouldn’t want anyone to have one like mine so I wouldn’t reproduce it either. Your copyright is safe with me!
Thank you for the kind words, they’re especially nice coming from you.
If I have a few hours when I come home from work, I spend it watching Law and Order reruns. This is why you have a nicer house than I do!!
Great job on the floorcloth. I love the block/dot design and the colors you used. Floorcloths are very time consuming, but so worth end result.
Kris