Painting Porcelain Tea Bag Holders

Hello again! I decided it was about time I came back to my poor, much neglected, blog and what better way to start again with than with a mini tutorial on painting porcelain teabag holders.

These particular teabag holders came as a pack of 5 from the UK educational and children's craft website, Baker Ross. You may remember I painted some seaside themed plaques that were also from that site for my bathroom doors in my last post (link here).

Instead of the porcelain pens I used then I used porcelain paints.  It was this set here.

To start with, I decided to try doing a polka dot effect on my teapot shape by sticking small sticky dots onto the teabag holder:

...before painting on top of the whole thing with my chosen colour, orange.  (The wooden stick in the paint is a bamboo skewer used for stirring the paint before use):

I was a little disappointed in the colour as I was hoping it would come out more opaque, so, to get round it I waited for the first coat to dry (which was only about 20 mins) and then put another coat on.  And then another...

Whilst I was waiting for the coats to dry I painted another teapot white as an undercoat.  I also painted that one orange on top after it had dried but even with the undercoat it was still more transparent than I would have liked... 

Both of them had an undertone of yellow which I didn't add but can clearly been seen here underneath the orange. 

I then painted another teapot white all over and added orange in parts.  I also added white to the middle of the all orange one. 

Unfortunately, when I came to take the sticky dots off the top one some of the paint came with it.  Maybe I should have left it longer to dry before taking the stickers off?...

 Finally, when they were all dry I added some of my own freehand lettering:

I decided to put these quotes about tea on them because I think it makes them look more quirky than putting 'Dirty Teabags,' which is what they are really made for.  

To finish them off I put them in the oven for the time and temperature stated on the paint instructions which means now they are both water and dishwasher proof.  Very useful for something that will need washing frequently.  

After all that I think it's time for a cup of tea. Put the kettle on, Polly!

Nicky, 
Creative Flourishes




 Disclosure:, Baker Ross gave me these products free of charge  for me to review.  All opinions are my own.