Want to beach-up your home by creating your own custom seashell art? Here is just the tutorial for you! We will cover the items you need and the sequential steps to take. (I do recommend a pre-requisite beach trip to find your own shells, simply for its own fun! – but you can of course buy shells, too). You’ll also find the basic steps of crafting with shells in the related article, Create Your Own Beach House with Shell Decor. Here, we’ll incorporate these steps to create seashell art in a tutorial that specifically shows you how to decorate 4”x4” tiles, somewhat similar to these seashell tile wall hangings.
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The items you need to create seashell art of your own based on the above tiles are as follows:
- 4”x4” tiles or 4”x4” canvas boards
- acrylic craft paints of your favourite colours (metallic colours especially pop, and you can even find glitter-infused colours)
- seashells (found on the beach of your choice or, optionally, bought from a beach shop, crafts shop or any physical or online retailer)
- any decorative materials of your choice, such as craft pearls (optional)
- a decent, sturdy glue such as clear-drying Art Glitter Designer Adhesive
- mini display stands (optional but recommended)
1. Designate a Workspace
Prepare a large, safe, and sturdy work surface that you won’t need to use for anything else anytime soon. Be sure there is enough space to arrange your tiles as well as all of your working materials like shells, paints, rhinestones, glue, and anything you may need to grab quickly such as paper towel pieces or toothpicks. This area should be undisturbed so that you won’t need to clear the space for any reason before you have completely finished the project. Make sure it is a high enough surface, or closed off area, to stay out of reach from curious little fingers, paws, or wagging tails if you have children or pets.
2. Select Your Paint Colours and Shells for the Project
Choose which paint colours you want to work with. If you have not yet used your paints and aren’t sure how the colour will actually look when painted on a surface, take out a test piece of paper or cardboard from your junk mail or recycle bin and squirt a dab to smear around and see how it applies.
Once you have decided on your favourite colours, sort through your shells and any other embellishments to select which ones you would like to use on the tiles. It is convenient to also sort them into groups. For example, move all scallop shells to one area, or sort your shells by size or by colour. This way, it will be easier for you to find whatever type you are looking for while creating your designs.
3. Pour Paint on Tiles to Create Hands-and-Brush-Free Designs
This is where the project gets fun, because you won’t know exactly how a paint design will look before you start pouring. You are welcome to modify this project however you like and use paint brushes to create precision designs. In this tutorial, we are going rouge by simply squirting paint on the tiles and then turning them to allow the paint to flow every direction we tilt. This is as simple as it sounds: squirt a dollop of paint on a tile (with sizes ranging anywhere from a penny to a golf-ball), and vertically tilt the tile multiple directions to allow gravity to pull paint toward wherever it flows. Your design could look like anything: an ameba, seaweed, or rain, for instance. Be creative and adventurous and see what you come up with! No two tiles will look alike. Some colours mix nicely, too, to create gorgeous fluid patterns.
As an alternative to paint designs, you could instead use a paint brush or roller to cover the entire tile(s) with paint as a background colour for your shell designs. This would give a cleaner, simpler look that emphasizes the shells themselves instead of both the shells and unique paint designs underneath.
4. Create Seashell Art Designs on the Tiles (*without yet gluing)
Once you finish your paint designs and let the paint fully dry, you are ready to add shells. But before you open your glue, first plan your shell arrangements on the tiles. This is the second fun part! Here you experiment by trial and error to see how exactly you prefer your designs. It is important, before you actually glue the shells, to be certain on your design arrangements. Designing all of your tiles in advance allows you to use your seashells most effectively. For instance, you wouldn’t want to use one particular shell on one tile and glue it, only to find out later that it would have been a perfect shell for a different tile. Planning everything in advance should prevent that.
5. Glue on Shells and Any Other Embellishments in Your Designs
Once you are settled on your shell designs, let the gluing begin! If you use the clear-drying Art Glitter Designer Adhesive, remember to completely clean the metal cone tip with hot water afterwards and let it dry before you use the glue again.
How to use Art Glitter Designer Adhesive
If you are using Art Glitter Designer Adhesive as your glue, you need to first remove the cap. Then, to use the metal tip for precision (which I recommend for this type of work), secure it tightly on the top of the open nozzle.
Be sure to secure the metal tip well in order to prevent a catastrophic glue avalanche later from exerting too much pressure. This shouldn’t happen the first use, but it could happen later if you don’t promptly replace the glue cap to cover the open tip/nozzle in between applications. That is because leaving the glue open to air can allow a tiny bit of it to dry inside the tip, and that partially clogs the opening. Then, with a clogged hole, you will have trouble getting the glue to come out and will instinctively squeeze the bottle harder. Too much squeezing eventually forces glue to push the entire metal tip off and come gushing out of the open nozzle. I’ve made that mess at least once or twice and want to help you avoid the same mistake!
A Note on Choosing Other Glues
If you use another type of glue, be sure to follow manufacturer’s instructions for use. For this type of artwork that is meant for display and won’t be handled except for carefully setting it onto a display stand or hanging from the wall, you should not need an epoxy-strength bond. Unless you are using exceptionally heavy shells, something like a hot glue gun or other decent bond should suffice for seashells and small embellishments.
Super glue provides a good bond but, for things displayed vertically (which includes all wall art and most things displayed on a stand), I have found it to be less reliable when a surface is bumped or wiggled. The pro of super glue is that it dries within seconds but the con is that it is brittle. Most likely, it should be safe for something hanging on a wall, but the Art Glitter Designer Adhesive provides a more flexible bond that I trust (and it’s much safer and easier to work with in large quantities). By not drying immediately, it leaves enough wiggle room to adjust a shell shortly after applying the glue. Also, I haven’t noticed any fumes.
6. Display Your Work with Mini Easel/Display Stands
Once your shells and designs have completely dried, your project is complete and you are ready to display your decor! Display stands come in all shapes, sizes and materials. Clear plastic mini display stands are affordable and do the job. If you display your art somewhere that is prone to such dangers as people bumping into the furniture on which it stands, slamming drawers, or any such quakes and shakes, you may want to find a more robust display stand that is larger, sturdier and heavier. But small, plastic and cheap should suffice for areas out of reach from anything other than an earthquake.
Alternative Display Method 1: Adhering Hangers to Mount on Wall
For this tutorial, I eliminated wall hangers and instead chose to use display stands. Previously, however, I created tiles to which I first affixed metal wall hangers on the backs so in order to hang the tiles on a vertical surface. Adhering metal hangers on the backs of tiles opens more display options since the tiles do not require a piece of furniture or shelf on which to rest in a display stand; however, the process requires more labor-intensive prep work and a separate workspace (such as a garage) which must be firmly secured against children or anyone who could come into contact with it, for safety reasons.
Epoxy Adheres Metal Hangers to Tiles But Must Be Used with Caution
JB Weld epoxy creates a fantastic auto-grade bond when used correctly. However, the fumes are toxic (and they smell disgusting), you must take extreme care to not let the product touch your skin (it’s basically liquid metal), the process of mixing and application requires a specific precision in order for the bond to work correctly, and each batch only lasts a few minutes before the bond weakens and the epoxy hardens (so you have to be quick and work with small quantities before mixing more). If you can safely and effectively use epoxy (or if you would like to learn), I recommend JB Weld for adhering metal hangers to the backs of your tiles. The last thing you want is to use a too-weak bond that eventually loosens and allows your tile to crash to the floor after breaking off of the hanger!
Art Glitter Designer Adhesive might suffice to adhere metal hangers to tiles, but the only way to find out is to test it and see how it fares after weeks, months, and years. I prefer a bond that I know will last, and certainly for a product I plan to sell. One thing to note about epoxy, however, is that it will not adhere to everything. My husband tested my tiles with metal hangers after the epoxy dried by using a nail to try and rip the hanger off. The bond survived this test on the metal hangers without any coating, but he was able to rip off most metal hangers that had a black coating, so we had to scrap those and replace them with un-coated metal hangers. Something to keep in mind!
Alternative Display Method 2: Hanging Canvas Boards on the Wall
If you use canvas box boards instead of tiles for this project, then you can just as well hang your finished art on the wall over a nail or thumbtack. The 4”x4” inch size is small enough that a thumb tack should suffice, though a nail or any kind of mount/hook may be more secure.
If you follow this tutorial and create seashell art of your own , I would love to hear how it goes! Comment below to share your experience during the process, or if you have any questions before or during the project. If you love seashells and want to venture out and try other home decor shell projects, check out Martha Stewart’s slideshow of seashell crafts to try as well. I hope you enjoy the process and take pride in your work, however it turns out. Botches and mistakes are not failures, only learning experiences to hone in on your technique. At the end of the day, remember to have fun and be creative!