DIY Network

Magazine Floor Collage Paper your floor with Michele Beschen. From "B. Original" episode DBOR-123

Turn your hard-surface floor into a massive collage.

If you are sick of your old linoleum floor—or simply want to B. Original with your floor covering—Michele Beschen has the project for you: A full-room decoupage that covers the floor with magazine pages.

The overall process is just like any decoupage project: Prep the surface, stick the paper down and protect it with a clear coating. But the effect is dramatic. You can paper your floor with anything from vintage magazine clippings (like Michele Beschen's project floor) to recipes to children's stories—whatever you like. This technique works best on a hard surface such as concrete or linoleum; scroll down for the full how-to.

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Magazine Floor Collage

Materials:

magazine and catalog pages
primer
wallpaper paste (designed for unpasted paper)
brush
smoothing tool

	Figure A
	Figure B

• Clean the floor and then prime using wallcovering primer or a sizing product. This project works best on a hard-surface floor, such as linoleum.

• While the primer is drying, prepare the magazine and catalog clippings. Michele Beschen used vintage publications from the 1940s through 1970s. Decide whether you want to clip out individual ads or articles, or just use whole pages. Also decide whether you want the edges of your pages to be torn or clean and straight. Make any changes to the pages you require at this point.

• Starting in the corner farthest from the door, brush an even coat of wallpaper paste (use the type designed for unpasted wallpaper) onto a section of the floor slightly larger than your first clippings (figure A).

• Place the first clipping on the pasted area and smooth out any air bubbles with a smoothing brush (figure B).

• Repeat these steps, pasting down clippings until the floor is entirely covered. For the project floor, Michele Beschen had the pages going in all different directions. This gave the overall floor a more balanced look than it would have if all the pages, photos and text were running in the same direction.

• Do not walk on the papered surface until the past has completely dried. The pieces will tear when wet. Let the paste set overnight before moving to the next step.

• Once the paste is completely dry, protect the floor with multiple coats of polyurethane varnish. Different varnishes have different effects on projects like this one; Michele Beschen suggests testing your polyurethane on a clipping outside the project room to see what happens.

• Once all the coats of polyurethane are on and dry, the floor's ready for action!

Clipping Art

If you're not ready yet to tackle an entire floor, you can use these same techniques to create a piece of freestanding art.

• Prime an artist's canvas and paint it whatever color you choose as a background.

• Choose clippings, pictures and other papers that have colors in the same family as the background color.

• Glue the papers down with regular household glue and seal with polyurethane.