We tried it: Painted Rug

If you're like me, you probably spend way too much time on Pinterest! I first saw this idea for painting a rug on Pinterest, and the tutorial that caught my eye was from The House of Smiths blog. I've had this beige rug in my kitchen for years. I bought it for about $30 at Lowe's for the sole purpose of protecting the floor from scratches that might result from shifting the kitchen table and chairs around. But I moved my table and chairs to my sunroom recently and the rug really wasn't needed anymore... I was contemplating getting rid of it when I stumbled across this idea! The rug lives.

I took pictures during the process of painting the rug, but be sure to check out the tutorial I used. I did a few little things differently than the tutorial, as you'll see, but it was a very simple project!

Original rug. Not particularly alluring, but nonetheless functional. 

I used an old can of dry-wall primer as my base color. I first tried using a regular paint roller to apply the paint, but it was hard to control for even coverage so I swapped it out for a paint brush. In no time I realized that it would take forever and a day to completely paint the rug and hide any of the old color, so I kept my first layer of paint light.

The white primer I used made the rug look more gray which I liked better than the beige. So I moved on to my design. I went for a super simple stripe pattern.

I used robin's egg blue Olympic semi-gloss paint for my stripes. I tried using a foam roller this time and it worked like a charm! It only took a few minutes to paint the stripes.

Once it dried, I placed it in my craft room.

I loved this project, and I've already been checking out rugs to paint for other rooms. In case you're wondering, the texture isn't too bad under your feet. You can imagine what latex paint feels like once it has dried on carpet--I wouldn't recommend it for a room in which you might sit on the floor often. But this project is easy, cheap, and a great way to add personalized detail to a room!

Courtney Kyle is the art director of Stitch Craft Create magazine. She lives in Alabama with her husband Jackie, two dogs, and two cats. When Courtney is not working she's at home stitching, painting, gardening or diving into some other variation of DIY goodness.