Your Mum brought over four old pine stools for your kitchen bar. Thanks Mum! But you’re not in love with them. In fact, they don’t go at all with your modern white kitchen.

Your next thought goes straight to a pot of white paint, which would of course help. But why don’t you take it up a notch, and embark upon a new trend in the world of interiors – dip dying!

The look you want to achieve is to have the bottom third or quarter of your item dipped in contrasting paint.

First step – choose an item for dipping. Durable materials such as cane, hessian, canvas and wicker are particularly suited to this trend. Try a cane basket, canvas tote or wicker laundry basket. Wood can be natural, stained or painted already. Slender wood legs work well – pick up a pre-loved wooden chair, stool, coffee table, side table, or dining table. A wooden high chair would be a fun choice too. If you want to start with a smaller item, try a terracotta plant pot or ceramic plant pot, pottery bowl, coffee cup, empty can, glass jar, vase, wooden utensils or chopsticks. Note that unless you seal the paint with a dishwasher-proof glaze, you won’t be able to wash ceramic items such as tea cups and bowls.

Try these easy examples:

1. Dip mini glass juice bottles to create a trio of bud vases:

2. Dip wooden chopsticks (note: the painted end cannot be washed without removing the paint)

3. Dip pretty tea cups (note: again, the tea cup will need to be wiped clean, not immersed in water, as the paint will wash off)

Now for the dipping. Choose a dip acrylic paint colour. Try the hot trend of neon pink or yellow – both look great on terracotta, white and wood. Fabric-based homewares like canvas and hessian look amazing dipped in white paint, or pastels such as egg-shell blue, peach, light pink and pale yellow. All colours would work well with wooden utensils or chopsticks and other smaller homewares.

Time to measure up. Choose a height for your dip and mark with a ruler and pencil on each leg, or at intervals around your object.

Depending on the size of your dipping object, you can choose to either actually physically dip the item, or paint on with a brush. Stool legs, small pots, utensils and chopsticks will dip easily. Larger surfaces such as tote bags and baskets will need to be painted. Don’t worry too much if the line is not completely straight, particularly on rustic-style textile homewares.

To dry, hang your item so that excess paint will drip onto the ground and not onto the rest of your product. You may have to dip the item multiple times after each coat is dry to achieve the desired opacity.

Once your painted item is dry, display in your home and wait for the comments.

My friend Lisa (the red thread) did an amazing job with the second-hand stool that she picked up (pictured). If you tire of the colour or the dip, simply repaint. Easy!

Have you tried the dip dye trend yet? Next on the to-do list are the jars in my pantry. It’s addictive!

Buy (and sell!) a range of pre-loved furniture pieces from eBay, perfect for dip dying. 

Try these searches:

• Dining Tables
• Bar Stools
• Side Tables