Annie Sloan: How to Paint Chalk Paint Masterpieces

The ability to paint and reinvent your own furniture is simply exhilarating. Annie Sloan makes the task so much easier with easy to use Chalk Paint that can be used to update almost any piece. Here we share a few chalk paint masterpieces and tips to painting your own furniture.

First up is this dramatic, brooding masterpiece of light and shadow by the painters over at Maisie’s House. They say one of the measures of an artist is their ability to capture light. In Fine Art, the term “chiaroscuro” is used to describe the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition. It’s wonderful to see this technique used on furniture and the end result is breathtaking. Click here for a step by step to how Chloe created this drop-dead-gorgeous vignetted effect.

If Caravaggio effect painting is perhaps a little beyond your capabilities then there are colours you can use with great light reflective qualities, for example Chalk Paint in Svenska Blue (pictured below). Bringing light into the home is a big concern for lots of people, as light creates the feeling of space and calm and we rarely have as much of it in modern domiciles as we would like. Traditional Swedish neutrals were developed to maximise scarce light supplies during the long winter days and nights, and this blue is inspired by those neutrals – hence the name! Make like Tin Barn Market and paint a whole piece in this one colour, then sit back and reap the benefits.

Finally, this piece by Welsh furniture painter, Myfanwy. Here she plays with a monochrome pallete of just three Chalk Paint colours, Graphite, Athenian Black and Old White. Her first step was to lay down a greyscale ombre on the façade of the piece using Graphite and Old White, then she painted a pattern using Athenian Black. The top is Athenian Black with an Old White pattern. Finally, a wash of Old White over the front before Clear and Black Chalk Paint Wax were applied to protect and finish. A very unusual, statement piece that she should be immensely proud of!