Try New Things Tuesday DIY Mercury Glass - Pinterest Win or Bust?

Erin has a confession to share with us - She is OBSESSED with all things mercury glass. Her obsession started with her wedding a couple years ago and is always trying to incorporate it into her apartment decor.  The only issue with mercury glass is that it's expensive!!  Not friendly for us ladies looking for something pretty on a budget! And then for my own wedding her obsession then became MY obsession since I was going for the shabby chic rustic look in my decor. After the holidays we went to all the stores to buy as much mercury glass on clearance as we could but it still wasn't enough for all of my tables, fireplace, etc for my wedding. So therefore my sister-in-law Erin and I decided to tackle this project to save some pennies and recreate the Pottery Barn look for less. 

The pinspiration we used was from Martha Stewart! Because everything that Martha does is simple to recreate right? (just joking Martha I love you) The decorations were simple enough, and we had most of the supplies on hand. The only thing we needed to buy was the Krylon Looking Glass Spray Paint. 

Supplies: 

• Krylon Looking Glass Spray Paint - Note, we had a hard time finding this in stores, so we ordered it from Amazon
• Vases/Votives of your choice in clear glass - Most of these we picked up at the dollar store and Michaels
• Newspaper and painter's tape 
• Spray bottle with water

Directions:

• Step 1:Tape the outside of the vases with the newspaper.  You will only be spraying the inside
• Step 2: Spray the inside lightly with the water bottle
• Step 3: Spray the Looking Glass Spray Pain into the vase.  You will see it pool at the bottom.  Rotate the vase so the paint coats the inside evenly
• Step 4: Place the vase upside-down to dry overnight.  Repeat as necessary.

The Verdict:  Pinterest BUST! 

We were disappointed with the way the paint coated the vases.  We found that we had to repeat this process 5 times and waited 4 hours between sessions (yes, we got impatient!) and found that it looked really dingy. 

We tested a few different kind of vessels, above are pictures of our results! We found that using a vessle with groves/texture let the paint adhere better.

Special note, if you plan to put flowers in the vases, you have to place a plain cup inside first with water.  The paint is not safe for plants. Which did not help me for my wedding since I wanted to use mercury glass vases. I ended up scrapping the idea of mercury glass for the wedding reception and just used mason jars, jelly jars, and antique jars! However, all of our mercury stuff we purchased did go to good use at my rehearsal dinner! 

Have you tried to make your own mercury glass?  Let us know if you had different results and most importantly what we did wrong!