diy etched glass

one of my favorite restaurants in the city serves water out of etched glass bottles (see picture above). i’ve always thought they were really cute! (surprise, surprise). i was excited to find home and away’s diy etched glass bottles (which is essentially the same as lil blue boo’s etched soap bottle also seen on pinterest) tutorial showing how i could create my own.

i still haven’t managed to make the bottle, but while looking for favors for a bachelorette party i recently planned, i found wine glasses at the dollar store and thought it would be a perfect opportunity to test out the technique.

i knew from the beginning the project was ambitious but it seemed simple enough (despite the fact i don’t have a silhouette). maybe it’s become the norm to have a silhouette (it sure feels that way according to most blogs), but it still feels a little out of my league (‘normal‘ maybe generous for me).

i used an x-acto knife to cut the stencil out of contact paper and felt like it worked pretty well. so if you don’t have a silhouette no big deal!

i then painted on the etching cream (armour etch- i found at an art supply store).

TIP: make sure you have really smoothed down all the edges around the cut out because the cream can easily run under the contact paper if you haven’t.

TIP: i had followed the instructions on the back of the armour etch that said to dilute the etching cream with water. bad idea. i definitely won’t do this again! i think it was the main reason my etching turned out so light.

as instructed by home and away i washed the cream of after about 15 mins. bad idea again! the glass was barely etched (maybe this was due to the dilution).

for the next 13 glasses i left the etching cream on for several hours (overnight for some).  it made all the difference! the etching was still light, but not nearly as bad. it was really hard to capture with a picture, but in the end i think they turned out pretty cute.

if i can do this, you definitely can! i can’t wait to etch something else. next time i’ll stick to something flat (trying to apply the stencil to a round glass was no easy feat).