DIY: Lilly Pulitzer First Impressions Canvas

So between co-oping full time this whole summer and trying to enjoy what little amount of summer I have, I decided to paint my own Lilly Pulitzer inspired canvas for my new Condo off of campus!

First. let's talk about the materials you will be needing.  Of course you can buy whatever size canvas you want and different shades of pink, blue and green. I bought all of my materials from JoAnn's and I will try my best to estimate the total cost. I will also list the specific color and brand of acrylic paint that I purchased.  Alternatively, you can purchase items from Amazon if you do no have a JoAnn's by you!  I'm a big fan of Amazon and you can sign-up for a free Prime trial which gets you free 2-day shipping!

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Materials Needed:

JoAnn's

- 12" x 12" Canvas: $6

-Thick, medium, thin paint brushes: $2

-Color palette: $0.80

-Americana White Wash Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Americana Baby Pink Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Americana Bubblegum Pink Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Americana Royal Fuchsia Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Americana Citron Green Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Americana Festive Green Acrylic Paint: $0.83

-Delta Creative Turquoise Acrylic Paint: $0.83

Total: $14.61

Amazon
-12" x 12" Canas: $8.33
-11-Piece Brushes and Palette $7.30
-34 Color Pack Acrylic Paint $16.00

Total: $31.63
(As you can see Amazon is a bit more expensive, but you end up with more brushes and colors!)

Now let's get started on the hard part! 

STEP ONE: The first thing I did was take a pencil and very lightly draw the outline of the flowers and leaves. This merely served as a guide for the placement of my flowers.  The acrylic paint is very thick and therefore easily covers up any stray pencil lines.

STEP TWO: Take the lightest color pink with a large brush and create the base of the flower.  Simply make arch shapes throughout the flower and spread them around.

STEP THREE: Take the medium pink with a medium brush and do the same as the light pink, but try to fill in more of the white gaps.  Feel free to go over the light pink to add some texture.

STEP FOUR: Take the dark pink also with a medium brush and follow the same technique used in step three.  Don't worry about covering every bit of white, you're going to paint white over it to add white strokes like in the print itself.

STEP FIVE: Take the lighter shade of green with the smallest brush and fill in the leaves.

STEP SIX: Adding texture and shading, take the dark green with the small brush and touch up all of the leaves. If you look closely at the actual print, some leaves only have the lighter green, so I left some leaves without the shading.

By now, your painting should look something like mine to the left (Or maybe even better!) I am a Chemical Engineering major after all...by no means am I a true artist. The last time I remember taking an art class goes all the way back to 7th grade! WOW, just about 7 years ago...my how time flies by!

STEP SEVEN: Using the turquoise paint and a small brush to fill in all the white gaps to color in the background.  If you want to use a medium brush to get the large gaps and then touch up the edges with a small brush that is fine.  I didn't stress too much if I accidentally covered the edge of a flower or leaf because we will touch up the flowers and leaves after the blue background is complete.

STEP EIGHT: Touch up any parts of the flower and leaves that were messed up in the process of painting in the background.

STEP NINE: Take a medium sized brush and where there are white spots left on the flower, cover it up with the white paint to make our painting more like the First Impressions print.

And Voilà! Your very own hand-painted Lilly Pulitzer Canvas :)

Please leave me a comment below letting me know how I did on my very first tutorial! If you give this a try, take a picture of your work and tag me on Instragram--> @KraftyKellzster.