Sunburst Wine Barrel Mirror

First of all, today as I type this, I am beat.  On top of my already full schedule, I decided to add a Boot Camp Class three times a week.  Last night was class numero uno and I am sore and tired, but I had a blast and can’t wait to make it through the first month stronger and healthier.  So wish me luck on that one.  My goal is to make it through the first month and not miss one class.  Tomorrow’s class is at 5:30 a..m.  Yikes.

But I bet that’s not what you came here for today, to hear about me getting my work outs in.  No I hope you came here to see the reveal of my mirrors.  I have to say that by far these have been my favorite project.  They have not been without some trial and error, but I’m loving the end result.

We started with an old weathered wine barrel that I had sitting in the shed.  I bought it several years ago, not knowing at the time what I would end up using it for, but it was cheap at only $5 and I loved the patina of the wood.  The first thing was to separate it and figure out how we would make it work. 

 

As you can see, we ended up with a good size pile of the boards.  The width of the boards varied and I kind of liked that look.  The first thing we did was cut each board in half.  I did this for two reasons, first, they were way too long and secondly, they tapered at each end and to get the look I wanted, I needed them to just be skinnier on one end.  (that might make more sense in the later pictures)

After cutting each board in half, I laid out the first set of boards and used epoxy to adhere the first set of boards around the front of the mirror, gluing them directly to the mirror.  I didn’t really measure, I just eye-balled it to get the look I wanted.  We had to cut the last board to fit. 

Once the front boards had been attached I liked it, but did not love it.  After some thought, we decided to cut the extra boards in half lengthwise to make skinnier pieces to fill in between each of the front boards.  We attached those to the back with the same epoxy.  Oh and I almost forgot, I used frog tape to keep them straight and drinking glasses filed with beans and set them on the boards to hold them until the glue dried. This time though, we measured three inches from the end and used that line to line it up with the back of the mirror, so that we could keep the same distance around.  When I flipped the mirror over to glue the back boards in place, I set the mirror on tope of a paint can to keep pressure off the front boards because the sort of bow out in the front.  I hope this is all making sense because for the life of me, I cannot find the pictures I took of each step. 

Once all of the epoxy had fully cured, I got the bright idea to use Disc Hangers so I could easily hang them on the wall.  Little did I know, you can’t use them on mirrors.  I did not see that little nugget of information on the package, but I attempted it and one stuck, but the other didn’t.  I went to the website for more instructions to see if I had done something wrong.  And, in fact, I had, I tried to attach them to mirror.  So instead, we simply screwed to tiny screws into a board on each side of the mirror, connected them with wire and with that we were done. 

Here they are, hung up in their new home and I couldn’t be happier.  I should warn you, I am proud of these and you are about to be hit with picture overload!

The gorgeous corbels above were purchased from this awesome blogger.  She might have a few more, so hit here up if you’re interested.  They are huge and chippy and old and gorgeous.  I have other plans for them, but for now, I love them where they are.

The ONLY complaint I have is that I have not yet had time to get my armoire painted and I really really hate the orangey color in these pictures.  Oh how I need like 5 more hours in a day. 

I would love to hear what you think of our handiwork.  I love them and get this, the entire project cost less than $25, including the glue.  How’s that for a bargain?