Sunburst Mirror
by
Lisa L Hall
6 Materials
$7
1 Day
Easy
I have seen these at many stores and thought they were so pretty but I was not going to part with $20-50 for one. Not when they looked so simple to make.
Finding the parts was probably the most challenging. I thought the dollar store would carry the mirrors but after checking 3 of them, I ended up at Hobby Lobby. Luckily it was sale day and I got my 8" mirror plate for $2.50. Normally they are $5.00 which is still a good price considering retail pricing.
The dollar store did have skewers so I bought two packages, one thick and one thin. I wanted different sizes. You don't have to do it that way.
Now it was the fun part..what color to pain the skewers. I love the metallic paints but silver is just overused right now. I went with copper. It has a more earthy tone to it...at least it does to me. I know nothing screams Earthy like metallic spray paint. Ha ha.
I'm very happy with the results and I have enough skewers that I can make another one.
Here are my supplies. Not pictured is my hot glue gun, Gorilla glue and a Ring hangers. The ring hanger was an after thought when I realized that it is quite heavy with all the skewers on it.
I love getting large deliveries. The box came in so handy when I needed to paint the skewers. This part is a bit time consuming..not for you, but you need to wait for the paint to dry, then flip the skewers and paint the other side. This part of the project took an hour from start to finish.
At this point, my skewers are dry and I am ready to start gluing them on. I found the center point of my mirror and now I'm going to set up my circle.
Remember when you learned to use this? Remember saying (or even your kids saying) when on earth am I ever going to use this in real life? I just found a way to use it.
So now the fun part. Gluing on the skewers. This took about 45 minutes. You can see that I placed my thicker skewers on first. Then I went in and filled in with the thinner skewers.
For those of you that are looking really closely....Yep I only painted one side of my skewers. I thought it would work....It didn't. Take the extra 30 minutes to paint both sides. Otherwise you have to tape up your mirror and go spray the skewers again to make sure they are perfectly painted.
Ok....this is the back side. It's completely done. I just need to add my ring hanger and wait for the glue to dry. Then it's up on the wall.
I added a piece of cardboard to the back, just cut a piece off an old box, so that the ring hanger would have something flat and solid to be glued to. Once that is on and the glue is dry, I can get it on the wall.
The project is estimated at one day but that is due to the drying time of the backing and hook. I wanted to use Gorilla glue rather than hot glue so I felt very confident putting it up on a wall.
Here are the ring hangers. I had these on hand for another project but they are very inexpensive; 2.00 for a container. They work on just about everything.
You can see I was not concerned about having a perfect circle with the cardboard. I did think about using cork board but I was worried that the weight might be too much for thin cork board. If you used a thicker piece or cork and wanted something more fancy for you wall to see, indulge.
When I glued on the cardboard I was very generous with the glue so it seeped in between the skewers. It just adds to the security of the project.
I'm super happy with the result. I don't think my picture does the copper paint justice but it's so nice. I want to make 2 more and put them up higher on the wall. It's a 12 foot wall that is naked. The end product almost 3 feet in diameter.
If you wanted something smaller, simply cut your skewers and it won't be quite so large.
Have fun.
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Comments
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3 of 25 comments
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I have an old oval mirror that I've kept stored in the basement because I hate the frame. I think I'll remove the frame and try something like this with it! GREAT JOB! And thanks for the idea!!!
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Please post photos!!! Have fun.
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Cool
Frequently asked questions
Have a question about this project?
How did you use a protractor? I see a compass but no protractor? Or is that what you meant?
We use fast chargers will this work?
How did you apply the wall hanger?