Inspired DIY Art – Using Wood & Rope

I mentioned in an early post that a few weekends ago I was working on a DIY project. Welp, that DIY project is finally complete! And I’m pretty happy with how it turned out.

I was out and about one week when I saw this beautiful piece of art where a mermaid was made from wood and rope. I thought something like this would be the perfect gift for my friend’s baby girl. However, it was $200?!

The piece of art inspired me to see if I could do it and learn a new skill. Also, saving money sounded pretty nice! And that’s exactly what I did!

This project cost me around $20! I had the wood, paint and stain lying around, so really I only needed to purchase the rope, some gloves and a couple paint brushes. Granted, the $20 isn’t including my time spent on the project, but I think all of my time and energy is so worth it.

We cut one piece of wood – 1 in. x 6 in. x 6 ft. – into 3 pieces, 23″ long. My husband covered the wood with painter’s tape to keep his cuts clean. He learned this from construction. :)

Next, we cut another piece of wood, 1 in. x 2 in. x 6 ft., into two pieces 12 ½” long.

These pieces were then screwed on the back, with 1 ½” screws, so all the pieces fit together.

After screwing everything together I outlined the mermaid with a pattern my husband created. I highly recommend this as it will help you as you work on your project. Then I stained and painted the wood.

Once everything dried, I used my glue gun to glue down the rope. Glue guns are AWESOME!!

The rope can take some time, but it’s all worth it, trust me!!

After the body, the hair and then the tail, I was done! All I had to do was add the starfish on her hair and voila! What do you guys think of the finished product?!

Some details…

A couple more..

I hope this inspires you to create pieces for your own house. There’s something special about doing it yourself rather than buying it off the shelves. And the neat thing about this is you can really do whatever your heart desires! Have fun! xo, Jenneke