Chalkboard Wall: The Illustrated Kitchen Wall

Are you ready for this? I’m about to BLOW.YOUR.MIND.

There is this paint that you can buy that turns any surface in  your house into a CHALKBOARD. 

True story.

Okay. I suppose at this point talking about how overdone chalkboard walls are is pretty much as overdone as chalkboard walls themselves.

But what about talking about talking about how overdone chalkboard walls are?!

See? Right? I just blew your mind, didn’t I?

So I mentioned wanting to make a chalkboard wall in this awkward little corner of the kitchen back in the plans/goals post at the end of last year:

Maybe now you’re all, “hey! you were just talking about wanting to move that refrigerator! So why are you wasting all this time chalkboard walling?! Huh? Why?”  Well. When that happens I think we will keep the lovely chalkboard wall and frame it out somehow. With wood. It will be nice.

I used Rustoleum chalkboard paint. I primed it and then put on five coats (yes! five!) and it still only took around half the quart.

One coat in, it looked like this:

It took a couple of days because each coat was supposed to dry for four hours before recoating. I used a little smooth roller and kept it in the fridge, wrapped in plastic wrap, between coats:

After the fifth coat, we let it set for 4 days, because this is what Rustoleum told us to do. Then we primed it by covering it with chalk and wiping it off, because this is what all the other blogs told us to do:

Then I referenced art and took pictures:

The kids descended on it immediately:

Within an hour it looked like this:

And within a day it looked like this:

So that’s kind of fun. Then yesterday we had a three year old over, so I went to erase everything so he could draw on it, and realized from the kids’ (mostly Gus and Ari) angry protests, that they wanted to keep the wall just how it was FOREVER. I felt this was impractical and silly. So we’re still negotiating on this point.

Here’s what the awkward corner looks like now:

Linking with:
Inspiration Exchange
Stone Gable’s Tutorials, Tips, and Tidbits
The Inspiration Gallery
The Shabby Nest’s Frugal Friday
Inspire Me Please
Tatertots and Jello’s Weekend Wrap-Up Party
Monday Funday


Comments

Chalkboard Wall: The Illustrated Kitchen Wall — 36 Comments

  1. Hello Gretchen~

    I might be strange, but I just can’t get tired of seeing chalkboard ideas, and especially love chalkboard walls! And I love yours and think it was the perfect place for a chalkboard wall as well. 🙂 My favorite is how it looked after a day! 🙂

    I hope you have a beautiful day! 🙂

    Blessings,
    Jenni
    {Swedish Prairie}

    • Thanks, Jenni! I still love seeing them even after the millionth time, too, so I figured that must mean I wouldn’t get tired of one in my house 🙂

  2. I can’t decide which I like better… that you are keeping chalkboards at the forefront of the trends or your genius art reference or the fact that you have yet again blown my mind with your fabulous writing. I’ll have to gel on that for a bit before I could tell you 😉

  3. Doesn’t matter if they’re overdone or not – it looks great. And it will be a lot of fun for the kids! I know, what I’m talking about, because I had one in my room, when I was a kid. Seems my mum was an early adopter 🙂

    Love, Midsommarflicka

  4. Saying chalkboard walls are overdone is like saying schools are too cool for chalkboards. Wait. They still have chalkboards in schools right? They haven’t completely converted to touchscreens or white boards have they? If so, even better. That would make chalkboards “vintage” and they’d be all the rage once again. At any rate, who cares if they’re overdone, chalkboards are fun! I love how your boys decorated it too. 🙂

    • lol! My husband’s school actually is all white boards and smartboards and such. maybe in elementary schools they still have chalkboards? we can hope!

  5. The chalkboard wall looks so fun for the kids. Chalkboard walls seem to be everywhere, but I love that they give you the excuse to have a dramatic black wall in your space and that they’re pretty practical in the kitchen too. 🙂

    • uh oh. okay, so what about what we’re doing….talking about talking about TALKING about chalkboard walls? yeah, maybe I’ll just have to resign myself to being unoriginal on this point 🙂

  6. It would be so fun to have an entire chalkboard wall. And hey, WHO says chalkboard walls are overdone? They’re fun, they’re in and they’re supposed to be talked about! And shown!

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