Aging and Distressing Wood

I designed a nursery for my niece, Kaylee, who just arrived last week. Since my sister in law didn't find out what she was having I had to wait to make the name for the accent wall. I stumbled on a Pinterest post on how to make new wood look old and thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try it out and I had everything I needed in my cabinets.

What you need:

White Vinegar

Steel Wool

Tea

Paint Brush

First you will want to take a piece of steel wool and put it in a jar with a lid. Add enough vinegar to cover the top. Then let it sit for at least 24 hours. The vinegar and steel wool will interact to create an iron based solution.

When you are ready to begin you will steep some very strong tea. I ended up making a second batch because I missed the part about it being strong. I'm not sure if that would have made a difference.

Once the tea is ready you will paint it onto your wood and let it dry. The tea contains tannic acid that causes a chemical reaction with the steel wool solution.

I let Jameson assist me with painting the tea on and he had a great time.

Once the tea is dry you will paint on the steel wool solution. I didn't let Jameson assist in this step.

When you paint it on it is a clear/light grey color but it begins to darken immediately.

This is the final shade my wood turned. Depending on the temperature and type of wood you use the color will be different. Now you just let it dry and the aging process is complete.

I expected the color to be a little more grey but I love the look and love that it was so easy and inexpensive to make. I decided however I wanted to make it look older so I dug through supplies until I thought would help me distress the wood.

Supplies:

Wood Wax

Wood Stain Touch up Pen

Spoon

Metal Comb

Jameson had fun with this step! We took the comb and the end of the spoon and went crazy on the wood, until I felt it looked nice and beat up. This made some of the light wood under the aged color show through so I took the wood stain touch up pen and colored the deep marks in. Then I applied the wax as a final finish coat to kind of seal everything. The wax really brought the wood to life.

I couldn't be happier with the results!

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