Step 1: Clean-up your rug. After vacuuming your rug and spot-cleaning any major stains, cut away any loose fibers or pilled threads from your carpet. Don’t worry if there are blank spots in your carpet, this will help give it the worn-in bohemian look we are trying to achieve.
Step 2: Prep your paint. Pour your paint into a paint tray. Use a foam roller instead of a cloth one to get better coverage. You don’t need to saturate the fibers of your rug, you just need to cover the surface area. The goal of this step is to create a blank slate for drawing on and to cover up any stained areas. For my rug, I wanted to achieve a light gray coverage instead of a stark white. The shade I used was called ‘Sterling’ from BEHR paint. You can use any light paint color you would like, as long as the Sharpie marker will show-up on it.
Step 3: Paint your rug. Begin painting your rug working from left to right, top to bottom. Let one coat dry fully, and apply a second coat. For my rug style, I wanted to create a worn-in look, so having strokes and a mixture of saturated areas was a good thing. If you’d like a flat base, you may have to apply several coats of paint.
Step 5: Cut out shapes. For a geometric pattern or bohemian style rug, cut out shapes from cardboard and arrange your pattern on the rug. Then, simply trace around the pieces with your Sharpie marker.
Step 6: Draw out your pattern. After drawing out your shapes, it’s time to color! Break out your Sharpie markers and get started. Bohemian style rugs are full of patterns that are overdyed or muted with a blend of bright colors. It’s easy to create this type of appearance using markers, so have fun with it!I love this collection of colorful markers from Sharpie, they were perfect for this project.
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Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post! GO