Succulent Sharpie Mug

The other day I was feeling really Pinteresty, you know the mood where you look at what you’ve actually pinned, and actually think about making one? I recently picked up a cute little pinterest-worthy succulent plant from Home Depot, and had no where to plant it. After doing the dishes and throwing that one mug that never seems to get clean back in for it’s 10th cycle, a lightbulb went off. Although this may seem really simple, I really wanted to see if the baked sharpie on a mug actually works. It would make the perfect little planter. Plus, I’ve seen so many yes’s and so many no’s that I had to try for myself.

So, I gathered my supplies up in about 30 seconds- my succulent, my old Ikea white mug (I’ve heard cheap ones work the best- and at $0.99 I’m not sure how much cheaper you could find one) and some regular old sharpies.

I created a colorful herringbone pattern on the mug by first adding straight lines using a rubber band as my guide, then adding little diagonal lines. Alternating the angle of the lines in each column creates the pattern all over the mug. Next, to give it some color I chose 5 different colors to fill in random spots with.

Now to bake it I combined a few different methods- I put the mug in the cold oven and turned it on to preheat to 400 degrees. Once it reached 400, I put my timer on for 30 minutes and walked away. After time was up, I turned off the oven and cracked the door until everything, including the mug, was room temperature. This step seemed to be the most important according to a lot of blogs.

I’m happy to say that it worked and my design did not rub off! The colors did deepen a bit which turned out perfect, but if you’re going for bright this method might not work. If I were doing it again, I would let the mug sit for a few hours after adding the sharpie for it to dry, as the last pink color I put on bled a bit in the oven.

I added the succulent, keeping it in it’s original container for now until I can prove to myself I won’t kill it (ha!). It’s now sitting in the kitchen on my West Elm owl cake stand with some cute hand soap (that smells amazing too)!

I love that there’s a little greenery, life and color in the small space, because if I zoom out, you can see it’s a typical apartment kitchen, complete with a blinding beauty bar. Interesting choice landlord, interesting choice.

So there’s my double sharpie mug meets succulent plant Pinterest “snack” if you will. On to the next project… Have you been tackling anything, big or small, off of your Pinterest board? I’d love to hear about them : )

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