Here I will show you how easy it is to paint your own canvas shoes. The best part, you can paint used shoes or cheapies like I bought for $5.00!
I find painting therapeutic and finding time to paint for the pure joy of it doesn’t happen every week! This week however, I brought my paints downstairs and into the living room and painted my canvas shoes while spending time with my family!
The Queen of Whimsy
First of all I need to give credit for my inspiration for the idea of painting my shoes AND part of my designs, the checks and clock face on the sides and back of my shoes to Tracey Bellion!
Tracey Bellion of TraceysFancy is the Queen of Whimsy. She teaches others how to paint checks, harlequins, stripes, blending, painting with water just to name a few. I have taken several of her online classes and they are always fun and informational.
Click here for Tracey’s post on painting canvas shoes also!
Supplies You Will Need to Paint your own Canvas Shoes
- Canvas Shoes- used or new
- Black permanent marker, fine tip
- Choice of Dixie Belle paint. The colors I used are Honky Tonk Red, The Gulf (green), Amethyst (purple), Daisy (yellow), and Soft Pink.
- Small artistic paint brushes
- Water bottle or mister or small glass of water to wet the shoe down before applying your paint.
- Water-repellant spray-to seal your shoes when you are done
How to Paint your Canvas Shoes: Step by Step
First I drew my design I wanted on my shoes. I stuck with simple circles and ovals for flowers, hearts and checks. My signature logo for Piper’s Paw Prints is an upside down heart with circles for a paw print. So that was easy to replicate! #PiperApproved
Before I forget! Take your shoelaces out before you start painting your shoes!
When you have your designs on your shoes and the permanent marker is dry, you will need to use your spray bottle or mister and wet the area of the shoe you want to paint. I only misted the area I was currently painting.
Wetting the canvas shoe down before you paint your initial coat lets the paint soak into the fabric of the shoe. This will give it a watercolor effect and will cause some bleeding. For these whimsy shoes, that means character!
Once the shoes had their initial layer of paint on, I stopped using the mister or water bottle. As I went back to paint in the designs, I wanted more color in those areas and water would have faded the paint too much.
Here you can see some of the bleeding.
Not too bad!
Adding water and then painting the first layer will also mask some of the markings you applied with your permanent marker initially for your design. But I have a solution for this!
Take note of my two flowers above!
Once I had the designs on my canvas shoes all painted the way I wanted, I let them thoroughly dry.
Once they were dry, I went back over the designs with the same fine-tipped permanent marker and outlined these areas in ink.
Not only did this make the designs on my painted canvas shoes POP, it helped to cover up any boo boo’s!
The final step on how to paint your canvas shoes is protecting them! I sprayed my shoes with water repellant spray we already had on hand.
TIP: The black and white checks. I just used the fine-tipped permanent marker to draw my lines up and down in about 1/2 inch increments (I guessed) and filled in the every other square with ink. Thats it!
Now I am dreaming of ways I can incorporate my Silhouette cameo into painting canvas shoes!
I’m thinking about adding small stencil designs like I did in a recent blog post here for a personalized sign I recently completed.
Let me know what you think and I hope you give it a try! If you do, tag me at #melissapetersondesigns #MPDtribe #PiperApproved
Don’t forget to tag Dixie Belle Paint Company at their group page Chalk Mineral Paint Enthusiast with #PaintItForward. Dixie Belle is donating $1.00 for every pair of shoes painted to Soles4Souls.
Also, don’t forget, I have a library of free SVG cut files for your Silhouette or Cricut crafts if you join my tribe! You can join below or click here to join!
Hope you have a great week and happy crafting!
xoxo
Melissa
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