Love in a Teacup (or Mug) Challenge

This challenge basically depicts someone special to you, if they were a teacup.

You will need

• Plain paper / A canvas / A fabric canvas: Piece of fabric, Masonite board or thick cardboard, craft glue, paintbrush, container and water / Tea Box: Tea box, water, glue, paintbrush and container
• Pencil
• Jar of water
• Paintbrush
• Milk bottle if using acrylics
• Acrylic / watercolour paint

You’ll start off by getting someone close to you to decorate a teacup that shows their favourite things, and their personality. They can then either give this to you to turn into an artwork, or if they can’t do that, they can send you a photo.

Here are two examples:

Preparations

Next, decide what you want to work on. If it’s just a plain piece of paper or a canvas, it’ll need no preparation. If you want to go the extra mile, however, you can use either a ‘fabric canvas’ or a tea box.

For the fabric canvas:

Cut a piece of Masonite board (or thick cardboard) into your desired canvas shape. Choose a piece of fabric that will both cover the board and look nice with the mug/teacup on it.

Now you going to stick the fabric onto the board. To do this, paint a layer of glue mixed with a small amount of water onto the board, and then stick the fabric on, folding it around the edges of the board.

When that’s dry, normally an hour or so, you’re going to paint a layer of glue on top. This is to create a barrier between the fabric and the paint, so that the paint doesn’t seep in the fabric. You’re going to us the glue-water mixture again, painting a thin layer on top of the fabric. Give it an hour again to dry, and then you can start drawing!

For the tea box:

Cut a side out of a cardboard tea box, ensuring that you don’t make it too small.

The tea box will also need a layer of glue, so that the paint has a rough surface to grip onto. Mix a dollop of paint and a teeny amount of water together. Don’t add too much water; the glue will dry transparent. Now paint a thin layer on the top of the box, then leave it to dry for about an hour.

Getting Started

Now that you’ve got your surface ready, you can start. Draw an outline of the cup/mug using a pencil.

When you’re happy with the outline, you can start painting. If you using acrylics, use a cut open milk bottle instead of a palette, so that you can avoid cleaning up the mess afterwards! Now paint the mug/cup in. This process can take quite long, so don’t give up! If your paint is not showing up nicely, you can first paint a white layer over the area of the mug/cup, then add the real colours.

Lastly, to add a personal touch, choose a word that you think best describes this person, and add it to the artwork.

Well done! You now have a beautiful painting to give to/send to/remind you of your loved one.

Obviously, you don’t have to use acrylic paint. In fact, you can use pretty much anything: water colour, oil pastels, coloured pencils…..it’s up to you. If you don’t feel like drawing or painting at all, you can even just decorate a cup and send it to a friend, getting them to do it back.

I hope you tried this challenge and found it fun! 🙂