Tip #1: A DIY Project: Changing the Look of your Floor

Redecorating a room often only involves the furnishings, the paint and texture, curtains, etc. Rarely does it involve the floors and when it does, it is usually either taking carpet out or putting carpet in. There was a DIY project shown on the home show recently that took flooring to a whole new level. A friend called to tell me saying that she had seen this great new “process” to make a floor look like stone and since she was redecorating a room in a castle theme, she wanted help in creating the rock floor. According to the DIY program the simple process involved cleaning the wood floor then using contact paper that you painted inside to create the rock formations. There were also several different colors of latex paint involved to get the realistic effect of rock.

Yes, I should have called in a professional decorator and painter, to either do the job for me or tell me what a stupid idea it was. But, by the time we were done we had learned the technique and it really didn’t look that bad. If you want to try this technique and don’t want to call in professional help, here is how you can create an “almost” real rock wood floor.

Supplies you will need:

Contact Paper

Scissors

Paper towels or a sponge

Brown, White, Gray latex paint

Foam paint brushes, these can be different sizes

1. Clean the wood and get all the dirt off of it. After that you will need to use alcohol or some cleaner that will strip all of the moisture out of the wood.
2. Get several roles of contact paper and cut them into 12” squares. Cut out the middle of the paper in a squiggly, free-hand shape so that you have a framed hole.
3. Once you have enough of these cut out to cover your floor, you remove the contact paper and stick it to the floor.
4. When painting you want to use brown, white, and gray. If you use black it will be too dark.
5. Some rocks have dark spots in the middle some have dark around the outside and have light spots in the middle. How you paint your rocks is entirely up to you. Once you have all the colors on a “rock,” daub it with a paper towel or a sponge to get a mottled affect.

As far as the rocks go, that’s it, you repeat 50+ plus times until you have all of your rocks painted then wait a day for the paint to dry. After it is dry take the contact paper off the floor. Now you get to be artistic. You are going to paint shadows for your rocks in those wood areas that don’t have rocks on them. Once you have done that, let it dry.

After drying, you will probably not be too impressed with the result, yet. But, once you paint the entire surface with polyurethane and let that dry, then put a throw rug on it, it will start to look pretty good. Remember though, this is not a quick project, and it will only be useful as long as you keep your castle theme going in your decorated room.

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