DIY Painted Retro Shoes

Hi there! I’m excited to share this project with you today for a few reasons – a) it’s ‘wearable art’ and what’s more fun than wearing something you created, and b) it’s a great project for Spring.

I don’t think there’s one of us who isn’t ready for Spring, right?

Seriously. What a winter!

These shoes are a paint-in-an-afternoon project too. Which I happen to love. Instant gratification and all that.

You only need a few supplies –

• white canvas slip-on’s. (I got mine at Walmart for under $6.)
• Fresh Foliage paint by FolkArt
• Deep Ocean Blue by Folk Art
• Pink Melon (not pictured)
• .500 Prisma pen (a fineline Sharpie will do just fine too)

optional: Krylon Matte Spray sealer

Start by penciling the shapes onto the shoes. Just randomly, maybe overlapping a few here and there.

There is no right or wrong to this.

If you’re uneasy about freehanding your shapes, you can cut some templates out of a manila file folder.

 

Then just trace around them.

I chose these ‘guitar pick’ shapes as the outline for some retro dandelions I saw online. But you could certainly paint any shapes you wanted.

 

Fill in the shapes, starting with one color. Then move on to the second color. This helps spread the colors around evenly, painting one color at a time.

I didn’t prep the shoes in any way, just painted right on top of them and it worked great. You could, however, basecoat the entire shoe first, if you wanted another color besides white.

 

After painting the blue and green, take the end of your paint brush, dip it into some paint and ‘dot’ randomly around the shoe.

This not only adds some extra interest, it also keeps you busy while the dandelions are drying.

 

Just for fun, add a third color of dots, like Pink Melon. A sunny yellow or bright orange would be cute too, or any other color that feels like Spring.

 

Once the paint has dried, it’s time to add some little lines and dots with your fine tip marker.

 

Just little lines with a little dot on the end to look like funky dandelions. If there’s room, draw some stems for the dandelions too.

You can also draw a little swirl in the dots.

I just added a few swirls here and there.

 

The marker will dry very quickly and then you’ll have a fresh new pair of kicks for Spring!

Which, hopefully, will be here very, very soon!

One last thing – you can seal the shoes with Krylon Matte sealer, if you choose. I didn’t because acrylic paint is really pretty durable however the sealer would also make them much easier to clean.

Colleen

about Colleen