Recovering Old Boxes

I’m one that LOVES to organize all her crazy crafty madness so if I can place it in a box to ease the visual reminder that I have a BILLION things in my office/craft room I will! You can imagine the amount of boxes and containers I’ve collected over the years along side all my crafting tools and goodies. However, the downside to all these boxes is the fact not all of them blend together on my shelving wall unit. There are colors and patterns that cover an entire spectum and it was starting to really get to me and drive me a bit batty. So I decided on a Friday afternoon I was going to drop everything to finally fix this issue…I know real problems right…but it was something for me that was worth the time to getting around to and resolve.

I’m so very pleased that I did because it makes my brain happier…something as simple as recovering boxes with paper….added so much joy to my day and something I still enjoy waking up to and visually seeing. The fact that it all is starting to blend together add a certain amount of peace…especially when it’s in a place I live in just about every day.

Sometimes in life it’s the little details that can make such a big impact…at least for me it does. This project is a great way to re-purpose those heavy duty quality boxes that are often disgarded for being unsightly…because honestly who wants a diaper or shoe box starring you in the face.

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First box I did was by far the easiest as it was done with contact paper and was the smallest of the ones that I did over. The other boxes where done with regular rolls of paper and glued.

To measure you want to make the piece about inch taller than the box.

Nice thing about contact paper is that it will come with a lined grid for cutting. Here you’ll want to simply eye and wrap around to touch all the way to the backside corner so that the front and sides are all one piece. The backside will be one solid piece as well measured to be the exact size of that particual side to cover the overlapped area of your other pieces. You can see better in the photos below.

You of course want to take the backing off and place on centering the front side of the box and making sure you match along the bottom edge as close as possible. (it’s important that you use a cutter to get perfectly strait lines)

Pinch edges to make lines to know where to cut.

Cut folded lines to the box and fold flaps down…start smallest then largest last.

Backside you want to cut exact size to cover and place and fold down access. Then you’re set.

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So here is the more tedious…get your fingers and hands sticky and make things happen way of recovering boxes. In otherwords the FUN lets get crafy way. This is done by measuring the same way as above which is making sure it an inch taller than the box. However larger boxes you want to do only one side at a time unlike how I did above. Start with smaller sides first overlapping the front sides…so measure to be about 1/2 wider that need be to overlap keeping in mind the last piece/side is the largest of the sides and is cut exactly to the size of the side to cover those overlapped areas to prevent any gaps from showing.

*Keep in mind with this one that I didn’t cover the entire sides and only that back portion of the folder holders. I like the black stripes but visually on my self was way too busy and didn’t match so I cover the back area to help tie into the rest of the items I have but kept the sides as they are being you can’t see them but still looked cut with the gold floral backing as a combo.

Since this isn’t contact paper…you need to use Yes! Paste. Why you ask…because any wet glue will cause your paper to ripple and you don’t want that. You want the nice smooth clean look that this glue will have when used. It has the consistancy of Vaseline but easy enough to brush on. You’ll definitely want a wide stiff flat brush to do the tick. It also isn’t like glue stick which will dry before you can apply it to the surface…and because it doesn’t dry immediately it allows you to “move” remove to reposition it to exactly the placement you need.

I ended up doing 3 more boxes and a bible on top of the ones I’ve shown you here. It was a papery covering mading fun filled day for me! Yes there was a happy dance and a load of peace that came with this project paper day.

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My Favorate tansformation box was this set here..(the larger one contains the majority of my washi collection). I loved the box but it really stuck out in a bad way because the teal blue color didn’t match with the rest of what I had. It just so happened I had gone to Hobby Lobby and picked up some of this amazing paper. It was just right to tie in all the colors and textures I had going on. I know it’s not a huge transfermation but for me it brought so much peace because it’s one of the first things you see coming into my house being that this room immediately to the left when you walk in with no doors. Also this self happens to me in view from where I site at my desk and looking at this puts a huge smile on my face…and that’s what matters here! 🙂

Thanks for joining me here with my very first project shared on my newly revamped site. I realize this is a simple and isn’t all rainbow and sunshine inspired as some makeover projects but something simple enough that anyone could do.

I hope to share more fun inspired projects in the future.

Be Blessed and Stay Inspired!