Sweet Vintage Wallpaper Covered DIY Jewelry Box

When it comes to handmade gifts for the ladies in my family, jewelry is usually on the list. This year for Mother’s Day I thought I would mix it up a little and make my mom a jewelry box that she can store her favorite pieces in. A thrifted wooden box works great as a starting base. Add a little paint and vintage wallpaper on the outside for style and sectioned compartments inside for functionality, and you’ll have a jewelry box that can rival an expensive boutique find. I had a great time making this DIY, and it was pretty quick to whip up as well. 

Here’s What You Need:

*Wooden Box, like a cigar box with a hinged lid

*Paint

*Vintage Wallpaper Scraps

*Martha Stewart Matte Decoupage Medium and a paint brush

*3″ Balsa wood strip from the craft store

*Craft Knife

*Glue

*Scissors

*A few sheets of felt

*Ruler

Instructions:

The first thing you need to do is paint your box. Paint the outside and the inside.

Once your box is good and dry, you can decoupage it. Lay out pieces of your wallpaper scraps on the lid. When you have a design you like glue them down by painting a layer of decoupage medium onto the back of your wallpaper piece and a little on the surface of the box, then smooth the wallpaper down onto the surface of the box. Cut pieces to fit for the sides of the box and decoupage them on.

 

Once the wallpaper pieces has been attached and you have completely decoupages the box outside, you can paint a layer of the decoupage medium over the whole box to seal it up.

Now you can work on the inside. The first thing you’ll need to do is cut your balsa wood. Measure the depth of your box and cut a couple of pieces to that dimension. Then measure the height of the box. Cut your pieces down to the dimension of the height so they will fit nicely. For example, my pieces were 7″ long(the depth of the box inside to inside) by 1.5″ wide (the height of the inside of the box from the bottom to the top edge of the box not including the lid.) Also cut a small piece to make a little section that will go perpendicular to one of the divider pieces you already cut. I made mine 4″x1.5″.

Now you need to glue your dividers into the box. Run a bead of glue onto the sides and bottom of the long pieces. Fit them where you want them. I made one to be 2.25″ away from the side edge. The second needs to be the same distance away from the side of the box as the length of the short divider you cut, in my case 4″. Glue your small divider piece perpendicularly to the one you just glued down. Let the glue dry.

Paint the dividers and the bottom of the box again.  Set aside to let dry. Measure the distance from the side of the box to the first divider strip. Mine was 2.25″. Now cut strips of felt lengthwise to be the same width as the distance you measured(2.25″.) Glue the strips of felt together to form one very long strip.

Accordion pleat the felt with pleats of a little over an inch. You should end up with a nice tight piece to fit inside the first divider space. Run glue on the sides and the bottom to glue the felt in place.  My lid had some foam I could not scrape out, so I cut a piece of felt to cover the inside of the lid. You can add felt pieces to the bottom of the box in the divided spaces if you like. And now you are ready to gift your handmade jewelry box!

 

 

I LOVE how this little jewelry box turned out! I think my mom will love it too! You can easily make your own in just an afternoon. It is really easy to customize as well! You can change up the look to suit your mom’s style just by the colors you use, and the papers you decoupage. I hope some of you will make one of these fun jewelry boxes for your favorite gals sometime. It’s really fun! I’ll be back next week with another sweet project. Until then…

Happy Crafting!