DIY: Mossy letters from Pottery Barn

I want to buy everything I’ve ever seen, ever, but I want all of it for free or dirt cheap - the American way! Example: These mossy letters from Pottery Barn. Super cute, and while I couldn’t wrap my head around how they are actually alive, I WANTED THEM. But geeze louise, look at that price tag: $80 for a piece of wood covered in moss (forrest trees say “whaaaat?”). If I have $80 with no better use than a moss letter from Pottery Barn, I hope I get jumped and stabbed by an orphan/shelter dog/endangered tiger/cancer patient because that is CRAZY. So instead of spending $80, I spent $15 and made it myself. HERE’S HOW.

1. BUY STUFF. First, go to the Michael’s website and download a paper-free coupon to your smart phone. The deals vary a little each week, but you can count on roughly 50% off one item - which in my case saved 7 bucks… for the orphans. Of course.

Then buy these things:

- A 12x24" piece of styrofoam OR a pre-made letter of your choice (~$7).

- A 14x48" Spanish Moss table runner ($14)

And buy these things if you don’t already have them:

- Hot glue gun

- A TON of hot glue sticks (because you waste 30% of them searing the skin off your finger tips)

- Marker/pencil

- Knife (if you are going the styrofoam route)

- Ruler (also for the styrofoam)

You’re almost done! Hahahahaha FOOL.

2. CHOOSE STUFF. If you found a pre-made letter, LUCKY YOU. That’s the cleaner, easier, faster route. But if you’re in my shoes don’t share an initial with your boyfriend, don’t want to be presumptuous by using his, and don’t want a first initial anywhere in the house because of a terrible history with LL Bean monograms… just use an ampersand. It just means “and.” Bacon AND eggs. You AND me. Wine AND chocolate. AND chocolate. AND chocolate.

I went to dafont.com to find some typology inspiration, magnified an ampersand that looked like the greatest ampersand of all time, and copied it to my styrofoam. I’m sure you could get all high-tech and project the image to something and trace something and stencil something but I don’t have time for that. I’m makin’ MOSS.

3. CUT STUFF. Skip ahead if you have a pre-made letter, ya big jerk. I used a kitchen knife to cut out my shape, being extra careful not to break the styrofoam when pulling pieces apart.

Yesssssss.

Did I mention this was a huge mess? I feel like I dropped a million rice-sized packing peanuts on an air hockey table.

4. LAY STUFF. With your shape/letter upside down, lay it on the wrong side of your mossy table runner (side note: open a window because that table runner smells like a magic marker covered in blue cheese). Trace a half inch to an inch around the outside, like you were outlining a body at a crime scene.

Err on the side of wide - you’re gonna fold this overhanding lip over and the more overlap you have now, the less you have to do later. Cut out that moss piece.

5. GLUE STUFF. Power up the hot glue gun and work in sections to glue the foam to the moss. Smooth out the major wrinkles, but know that the moss covers up most imperfections.

5. GLUE MORE STUFF. Cut a little snip from the edge of the moss towards the foam at each corner and at every few inches along the curves. These little breaks help you fold up the moss. If you left enough of an overhanging lip, you’ll be able to get through this pretty quickly. If you didn’t, you’re gonna burn your fingers and cuticles with lava for the next 45 minutes.

Draw a line of hot glue along the edge of the moss and fold it up to the foam. There’s a mesh underneath the actual moss that hot glue seeps out of, so I used a sharpie to lightly hold the moss in place while it dried.

6. PATCH STUFF. Inevitably, there will be spots where the foam/wood/paper mache shows though. Use scraps of the mesh moss for big holes and little clumps of the moss by itself for patchy places that just peek through. It’s ok to let this look kind of wild and organic - if anyone asks, you found this magical creation in a wood where it grew in isolation for one hundred years.

Note the little strand of hot glue that was trying to cauterize my finger.

7. PLACE STUFF. That’s it, yo! I made mine to balance out a bright orange frame in the dining room, but this would be cool in a living room, bathroom, patio… send me pics if you decide to make one of your own!