DIY Inspiration: Liberty and a Quick Tip for Personalised Ceramics

Sorry blog friends for my radio silence over the last week, work has been crazy and over the weekend I travelled to the big smoke to the amazing Blogtacular event (round up post of this coming soon). Whilst I was down there I managed to make time for a trip to Liberty, one of my favourite places of all time and a great source of inspiration for DIY projects.

There were a couple of sections that really caught my eye:

Monogram Plates

Monograms are making a comeback in a big way and there are monogram DIYs popping up all over the place. I love these plates, each letter is made up of illustrations of things belonging to that letter e.g. M is made up of mushrooms – such a cute idea. Not sure why there’s no F though…

Along the same theme I then found these plates with super quirky illustrations on – the cat with the monocle and the dog with a  top hat are my faves.

Monocle cat is even on a cake stand – a DIY that I’ve been wanting to try for ages!

It turns out that creating the above effects isn’t as hard as you think, in fact, all you need is a Sharpie and an oven! Simply draw your design onto a plate or mug of your choice and leave to dry overnight. Bake in the oven at 180 degrees C for about 30 minutes. The oil based Sharpies are best for long lasting results (repeated washes etc) but if it’s just for decoration purposes a regular Sharpie will work just as well.

To create the beatuiful designs above obviously requires some illustration talent but, if like me, you’re not too talented in that area clever or witty catchphrases, doodles and geometric patterns also look really cool!