Painted wooden bracelets are one of the most unusual and beautiful jewelry. Most often they attract attention due to their non-standard design. Today, such bracelets are at the height of fashion and are a desirable item for almost any girl or woman. Of course, you can purchase a finished product, painted in one style or another. However, it is much more pleasant to paint such a bracelet yourself - this will allow you to fully reflect the author’s idea and create a truly unique item. In this master class you are invited to paint a wooden bracelet using the Gorodets painting technique.

What you will need for this:
1) PVA glue or gelatin for primer.
2) Fine-grained sandpaper.
3) Acrylic paints.
4) Gouache or tempera.
5) Brushes: round “squirrel” No. 1, No. 4 or No. 5, flat “synthetic” No. 5
6) Transparent varnish for wood
7) Wooden bracelet blank

First stage. First you need to prepare the surface of the bracelet for work. First of all, it is necessary to apply a layer of primer to cover cracks and dents, which are almost always present on the workpiece due to the nature of the material. The easiest way is to use PVA glue for priming - it is available in any office supply store, is inexpensive and does not require additional preparation before application. However, if you want to do everything according to time-tested technology, dilute the gelatin according to the instructions indicated on the package, while observing the proportions of 1 part gelatin to 8 parts water. The primer is applied using a flat brush evenly over the entire surface of the workpiece, including the inside. If after application there are places where there is a little more primer, and it protrudes a little, do not rush to remove the excess layer and wait until it dries completely. Once you are sure that the soil is completely dry, you can take out the sandpaper. With its help, you can finally eliminate all irregularities on the surface of the workpiece.

Second phase. Now you need to apply a background layer of paint, on top of which the main part of the painting will be applied. It is best to perform this part of the work with acrylic paints, since after drying they are poorly soluble in water, which means that they will not be mixed in when applying further drawings. The background is painted with paint diluted to a very liquid state, and it is better to do this on a previously wetted surface and extremely quickly. If this is not done, ugly stains will remain. It's worth noting that this makes the background translucent, but if you don't like it, you can always add a few more of these layers. Traditionally, in Gorodets painting, the background is painted with either ocher or red paint. In this case, the background layer is red.

Third stage. Gorodets painting is carried out in several main stages. To begin with, the main color of the future elements of the ornament is applied. The base of the flowers is a circle, complemented by petal protrusions. The leaves are depicted with teardrop-shaped strokes. At this stage, you can already make various additional decorative elements, and later supplement them. All painting elements are best done with a round squirrel hair brush using gouache or tempera. You should start with the central objects, then moving on to additional ones.

Fourth stage. This stage is usually called “shadowing”. It consists of working out some of the details of the ornamental elements using black paint. “Shading” is done in various ways, depending on the element. Care and caution are required here. You should not rush in the painting process, because otherwise you can make a mistake in the position of the stroke or miss. You can use either a large brush or a brush with a smaller diameter.

Fifth stage. Now is the time to tackle one of the final stages - “revival”. To do this you need to take white paint. The process of “revival” is, in its essence, very similar to the process of performing “shadow”. It is named so because it really enlivens the ornament, making it more interesting and even a little voluminous. After the “revival”, only the small details of the painting remain to be finalized. They are done with a thin brush in order to make it as neat as possible.

Sixth stage. After the painting is completely ready, you can coat the product with varnish. This is done so that when wearing the bracelet the paint does not smudge or get scratched. It is worth noting that when choosing a varnish you need to be careful. First of all, it must be colorless, otherwise it will cover and discolor the paint. You also need to pay attention to how quickly and well it dries, since there are varnishes that continue to stick even after several months. The varnish should be applied with a soft brush to avoid smearing the paint. It is necessary to varnish not only the outer part of the bracelet, but also the inner one. Once the varnish is completely dry, you can put on and wear the bracelet without fear of ruining it.

Do you love handmade fashion accessories? Then hand-painted wooden bracelets are just for you. They have already been forgotten enough by fashionistas to be considered an ordinary phenomenon in our time, but like any hand-made item, they are in high demand and popularity. We invite you to join the site’s master class and create an original accessory with your own hands.

You don’t have to be a talented artist; anyone can make a polka dot bracelet, and if it’s a little crooked, it will only be a hint of the “primitives” that are fashionable in handmade goods and go well with wooden bracelets.

So, to make hand-painted wooden bracelets you will need:

wooden bracelets-blanks of arbitrary width;

white acrylic paint as a base;

acrylic paints of other colors;

synthetic fiber brushes (mine, unfortunately, are pony) - thin and thick;

if you are going to make a polka dot bracelet, it will be convenient to paint not with a brush, but with an acrylic outline in a tube;

acrylic varnish, matte or glossy;

sandpaper, file or just a nail file.

Painting bracelets - work procedure:

Step 1. Inspect the wooden bracelets - they should not be uneven or unpolished. In this case, you need to use a file, and if you don’t have one, an old nail file will do. Make the surface of the bracelet as smooth as possible.

Otherwise, the paint will fall on it like this:

Step 2. Paint the bracelets completely white. Of course, if you plan to cover the accessory with black paint, you can skip this step, since in this case the texture and color of the wood will not distort your idea. If you are planning something airy-light-clean, then we advise you to cover the bracelet with a layer of white paint, or even more than one. I had to do three layers because... My paint is highly transparent.

Important: before applying the next layer of acrylic paint, the previous one must dry completely! Therefore, be prepared to wash your brushes and change the water after each “approach”, otherwise the working tool will be irrevocably damaged.

Step 3. When all the bracelets are covered with white paint, and the texture and color of the wood does not show through, we proceed to applying the design. If you have a complex pattern in mind, use a simple pencil to mark its boundaries. My bracelet painting is very simple, so I limited myself to just dividing the bracelet in half with a line before painting, because, I repeat, I don’t have very good white translucent paint, and the design will still be a little noticeable - I did this so that the bracelet The polka dots I had were half white and half pink.

Step 4. Mix paint on the palette to get the desired shade. I wanted to achieve a soft pink, for this I first applied a few drops of white paint to paper (instead of a plastic palette, it’s more convenient for me to use a piece of whatman paper), and then, after washing the brush well, I gradually added red so that the shade did not come out too dark. You will need a little paint.

I painted flowers on the outside of one bracelet with pink paint. If you look closely, you will notice that they are very simple and not very smooth:

I used a fine size 2 brush.

In color painting of bracelets, if you do not use ready-made shades, but mix them, try to do all the work with one color in one step, because then you are unlikely to be able to mix the paints so as to get exactly the same shade.

I quickly painted half of the second wooden bracelet with the same color, as planned, inside and out, applied polka dots to the white half on the outside, and then hung it to dry on the balcony.

At this time, the outer part of the first bracelet had dried slightly, and I was able to decorate the inside of the bracelet.

While we were working on the inside of the “flower” bracelet, the polka dots were already slightly dry, so we carefully applied pink dots to the inside of the white part of the bracelet and left the bracelet to dry. We are done with the pink color, I just used it to cover up the chip on the pink part, which you see in the photo below - it was formed through my fault, so be careful.

Step 5. The final touch to the painting - when the pink layer is dry, make white centers in the flowers, and make white dots along the pink part of the polka dot wooden bracelet. It’s convenient to make them as an outline, but I worked with a brush. The contour would be smoother.

When painting a bracelet, do not forget to pay attention to its inside - this gives the work completeness.

Step 6. When all the paint has dried very well, it’s time to varnish. This is also an important stage, since acrylic painting is not scratch-resistant, and your pretty accessory today may upset you with chips and scratches tomorrow. Because My white background paint is matte, I chose a high-gloss varnish:

All photos from the article

To make stylish and original jewelry, it is not at all necessary to use precious metals. From time immemorial, our ancestors used natural materials, the main of which was wood. Among all the variety of different costume jewelry, wooden bracelets occupy a special niche, which we will talk about now.

Where can I find pre-assembled wooden bracelets?

If our lesson seems difficult to you, then you can always find a large selection of ready-made wooden bracelets at this link. For readers of our site we offer a special 5% discount using the code - rubankom.

Why wood

• Affordable price is far from the only advantage of the material, although in this regard there are practically no equals to wood. To make small crafts, such as bracelets, you do not need an expensive timber or calibrated board. Furniture production waste in any workshop will be given to you for free or for a symbolic price.

• No overly expensive tools or machines required. To get started, all you need is a set of sharp knives and sandpaper. As well as paints, impregnations and mastics, most of which can be made with your own hands.
• The concept of clear instructions is generally inapplicable to any creative work. If your imagination is all right, then the only way to ruin a wooden bracelet is by completely destroying it. All other minor defects, with a competent approach, can easily turn into original solutions.
• It has been known since ancient times that, in addition to its natural beauty, wood has a positive aura and such jewelry can have a beneficial effect on its owners.

• Making bracelets is a wonderful hobby; by introducing children to it, you will not only contribute to the development of artistic taste in your child, but also teach your child how to use the tool correctly. In addition, the growing fashion for original works can turn your useful hobby into a profitable business.

Subtleties of working with wood

By and large, anyone can make a simple wooden bracelet with their own hands. This area can be divided into two areas. The first and simpler one is carved and stacked bracelets with an open solid texture. The second direction is.

Advice: do not start with highly artistic carved models or fine paintings. Take on what you can do here and now. Remember, mastery comes with time.

What type of wood to choose

Of course, it is better to start with, such as linden or cedar. Having mastered the basics of work, it will be much easier for you to switch to hard and dense wood. Also, an important role is played by who exactly the bracelet is made for.

Dark, with an open, pronounced texture, men's wooden bracelets. While light and painted decorations appeal to the weaker half of humanity.

Thin branches, as well as the upper part of the crown, have a too porous structure, they are not strong and are harder to work with. Professionals prefer to use the lower part of the trunk or thick roots.

Tip: Small and thin parts break easily. Therefore, it is better to immediately put aside an array that has knots; use only homogeneous wood. Agree, it will be a shame if the finished segment into which you have invested your labor bursts on a knot when pressed carelessly.

A girl can never have too much jewelry in her box. Nowadays a large number of handmade jewelry has appeared, this includes plastic, epoxy resin, beads, knitting, and whatever else needlewomen do to decorate themselves. I propose to join them and master another technique for creating designer jewelry - “One Stroke” or double stroke.

To paint bracelets using the double stroke technique we will need:

- Flat synthetic brushes No. 4-5 and No. 10.

Stage 1.

First you need to moisten the workpiece with water so that later the paint on it will spread, forming smoother transitions.

Stage 2. Background for painting.

We paint the bracelet, creating a background for future painting. To do this, apply the first color of paint to the wet base using transverse movements of a wide brush and paint over a few centimeters of the surface. Without washing off the remaining paint from the brush, pick up a second color and continue moving. This way you can add up to three or four color transitions, but I don’t recommend getting too colorful, since we will be decorating the bracelet with flowers on top, and a colorful background can spoil the impression of them. We finish with the same color we started with to complete the ring without abrupt transitions.

We paint the inside of the bracelet in one color. It can be anything, the main thing is that the scale matches the painting.

Stage 3. Now we need to start painting. For this we will need a palette to make a color stripe and a piece of paper to practice on. If you haven’t picked up a brush for a long time, and even more so if you’ve never painted using the one stroke technique before, be sure to practice on paper first. The diagram shows what elements we will need for painting.

Do not lift the brush from the surface while making one stroke. One movement should produce one element.

Step one:

Making a color stripe. Place a light color on one edge of the brush and a dark color on the other. We draw it exactly on the palette, then we will constantly use this strip, adding a little paint at a time.

Step two: Let's try to make a simple petal. The height of the petal will be equal to the width of the brush. Place the brush vertically and press lightly so that the bristles bend. The brush does not need to be laid down completely, it should remain in an upright position. Then we slowly draw an arc, while one corner of the brush remains motionless.

Step three: A more complex petal can be drawn in the same way, but add an up-and-down movement to the arc. The main thing is not to make too much of a run-up between zigzag movements; do them no more than 1 mm from each other.

We make a flower from three complicated petals, wait until it dries and make 3 petals in a checkerboard pattern on top of the first. For the next layer of petals, you can turn the brush over so that the colors swap places; of course, you don’t have to do this.

Step four: Leaf. We repeat zigzag movements and arc movement, but with each subsequent movement we reduce the height of the zigzag. That is, first we place the brush with all its bristles on the paper, and, without stopping the movement, we gradually lift it so that the sheet becomes thinner.

General tips. Don't forget to periodically add paint to the color strip. The brush should not be wetted too much, just lightly moisten the tip.

Don't lay your brush too tightly and try not to lift your brush from the paper while you paint, even when you need to make a turn.

When painting, it will be more convenient to rotate the product or sheet than to position your hand at the desired angle. If you are just getting acquainted with this painting, then it will be most convenient to outline the flowers and leaves with a pencil on the product in the size of the painting. This will help you understand the composition and make the painting process easier.

Stage 5. Additional elements. After the bracelet is painted with flowers and the paint has dried, we begin to highlight the design. Take glitter and apply dots along the edges of the petals and in the center of the flower. We use teardrop-shaped lines to highlight the edges of the leaves. To do this, first press the tube harder, and then stretch it out with almost no pressure. The final touch: we apply spirals, sprouts and lines to the part of the bracelet without a pattern; if there is space left between the flowers, then you can apply the same lines and spirals between the elements of the painting, with small additions to the flowers.

Well, our bracelet is ready! Once you get the hang of it, making such a bracelet, pendant or box won’t be difficult and won’t take much time. Wear it with pleasure!

Artist: Averinova Alexandra