DIY Coral

The Spring and Summer Pottery Barn catalogs had beautiful faux coral for sale in them.  Even though PB's coral was not as  expensive as real coral, it is still more than I can afford. 

 In doing a little research on what coral actually looked like,
I realized that it has many forms and some of them look like 
things already made for me in the floral section of Hobby Lobby.

I was hoping that with a coating of a neutral color of paint

that the multi-colored floral items could start to look like coral. 

My hopes that a quick spritz of white spray paint would 
cover the colors on the florals were dashed as the color kept
 on bleeding through.

   

This purple stuff was the worst at just sucking up 
paint and still being purple.

The most interesting side of the dried mushrooms just would NOT take paint.  I finally gave up on this side of the mushroom and used the other side which did take paint wonderfully.

These plastic green spike-y things not only resisted regular spray paint but also specialty plastic paint (which was left over from another project).

Finally, after a spray coat of this and a brushed on coat of that, most of the elements got to looking close to the color I wanted. 

Real corals come in a wide variety of colors, but for this project, I just wanted kinda neutral colors.

To add some texture and interest, I splurged on a couple of cans of texture paint to give a final spritz if needed. ( I had discovered this worked well when I was trying to give a sand look to my Faux Sandcastles earlier this summer.)  Also, if needed, some pieces got painted with glue then sprinkled with a coat of real sand or crushed sea shells (from WalMart).

For the brain coral and bases for the other corals, I used "Great Stuff" foam in a can ($3 per can at paint department at Walmart).

I didn't realize this photo was so foggy.  The camera came out of the air-conditioned house into the heat and humidity that is an Alabama summer and the lens clouded up.   

Follow the directions on the can to "wear gloves" when you are using this foam.

  If it gets on your skin, you will be wearing the foam for a few days. 

 It also sticks to whatever it touches until it is dry so I squirted it out on wax paper that I

 could just peel off later.  Keep kids and animals away from it until it dries completely.

  The foam goes a  long way.  It puffs up a lot.  It is pretty hard to make very specific
 shapes with it.  I tried making some starfish with the foam but I had to label them 
"whimsical" due to the crazy shapes that they turned out to be. 

So after the painting, it was time to pair the florals 
with the foam bases.

The florals were attached to the foam globs with hot glue.

If necessary, they got another coat of paint.

For instance, the items below turned into...

...Spiny Coral.

Here are some more combos...

This is the side of the dried mushrooms that DID take paint.

Mushroom Coral

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Persimmons before paint...

...after paint...

become Cavernous Star Coral.

A little of their original color is showing through but it makes it have just a slightly different color than the other items in the coral display which I like.

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I don't know what this purple paint sucking item's official name is but it became...

 Sea Whip Coral

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I think this is maybe thistle but it became...

Polyp Coral

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Twigs and foam and paint became...

Branch Coral

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Bamboo covered with tiny broken shells became...

...Pipe Organ Coral.

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Baby acorns glued onto foam holding up a painted plastic fern becomes...

...barnacles on the base of Gorgonian Coral.



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A blob of spray foam painted and dusted with sand becomes...

...Brain Coral.

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Tiny foam balls on a foam base becomes...

...Tentacle Coral.

This ended up being so heavy, I had to put it on a different base to keep it from tipping over. 

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Here is a picture of all the coral together in a display.

You can see more close-ups at this post.

This little arrangement of all the types of coral

 was made to fit under my new glass cloche. 

You can see more pictures of the coral in the cloche in this post.