Milk Glass the DIY Way

As you all have seen I love milk glass and I want to use a lot of it in the wedding.  The only problem is that it can be a challenge to find inexpensive milk glass vases.  I have been picking them up whenever I find them, but I would like to have one milk glass vase per table at least and I am not quite there yet.

The solution to this problem came to me from a post by Emmaline Bride (have I mentioned how much I love that blog?!)  Since Cameron and I decided the look and feel to our wedding we have been collecting vases from thrift stores, but we have also been saving any glass bottles that we aquire from various liquids that we consume.  This has left us with a large collection of not-so-interesting glass bottles that need a face lift.  Mix an abundance of plain glass bottles with a need for more milk glass vases and you have a DIY project that makes me smile :)

First I started off with several plain glass vases and bottles.

The goal is to use white puff paint to create a design that helps the bottles to achieve the look of milk glass.  Here are some examples of milk glass vases that I have already collected for the wedding:

I went into the step of puff painting with the idea to have fun with the designs and not with the idea to completely recreate milk glass designs that I have seen.  This allowed me to have more fun and also not worry about being perfect.  

Here is what the plain glass vases looked like after the puff paint designs were applied:

Once the puff paint was completely dried, I moved on to spray painting the bottles.  I chose to use Krylon's indoor/outdoor paint in glossy white.  The back of the paint can stated that it was good for using with glass and I wanted the glossy finish so that the bottles had the smooth look of milk glass.

Spray painting was definitely an adventure.  The paint was quite runny which meant that we had to apply very thin coats.  We ended up doing around 4-5 coats to get the even coverage that we wanted.

Even though it was messy, the end product was well worth the work!  I am really happy with how the bottles turned out, and the bonus is that I have increased the amount of milk glass vases we have for the reception without spending extra money for pricey real milk glass :)  

This is one happy bride!