Window Mirror

At our previous house, I didn't have a fireplace.  Sad, but true.  Now that I have one again, I needed something to put above the mantle.  I had been thinking about getting a distressed window for a project and decided this would be a good use.

A couple of years ago, I had made a picture frame into a mirror for my daughter's room.  I used Krylon's Looking Glass Mirror paint for that project and loved it so much I wanted to use it for this window project as well.

I found a window at a local store.  Since I am new to the area, I haven't found all the good places to shop for my resources so I paid a little more for this window than I wanted.  Still, it was only $20, so nothing to break the budget.

It needed a lot of elbow work.  One of the panes had been broken out, but there were still some broken pieces of glass in there.  All around the edge of one side there was some glue that had apparently been used at one time to glue the window closed.  I scraped all of that off and scraped the paint splatters and such off the windows to give a clean surface.  I then cleaned the whole window, especially the parts with the spider webs and their spiders--yuck.

I had originally hoped there would be some great colors underneath the purple-blue paint on the window, so I grabbed my sander.  Unfortunately, nothing good.  I then used a wire brush to scrape off any loose paint.  Once everything was cleaned up, the process was pretty quick from there.

Since this window would be for indoor decorative purposes, I bought some graphite colored craft paint.  I already had the gold paint from some previous projects--I love this paint from Martha Stewart!

First, I took off the hardware on the window and cleaned that up.  The hardware will be perfect to hang a wreath on the window, which is what I will eventually do once I have my Fall wreath made.

Next, I took my mirror spray and painted the back side of the windows following the directions on the can.  I decided not to replace the glass in the empty pane.  I think it gives the window a little older look.  After that dried, I painted three coats of the graphite paint on the front.  The first coat was a little hard because I did not check to see if the paint was an oil-based paint, which it was.  I really should have primed the frame first, but since this window is for decorative purposes I shouldn't have a problem with the paint staying put.

After the graphite paint was dry, I took my gold paint and rubbed it on the window using a paper towel.  I love how the older paint underneath created texture for the gold paint to grab.

After all the paint paint had dried, I flipped the mirror over and screwed two eyelet hooks into the back, one on each side.  I then threaded and attached the picture wire onto the hooks.  I made sure to measure where I needed the wire so the picture hanger would not be visible once the mirror was up. 

I wanted the mirror to look as if it were just sitting on the mantle and leaning against the wall, but I needed it to be secured to the wall so that little kiddos couldn't knock it down and get hurt.  I measured from the bottom of the window to the top of the wire that I pulled up tightly (as if it were hanging).  I then placed the picture hanger approximately a half inch below that measurement on the wall.  The picture still leans against the wall, but will not fall forward, especially once I put a wreath up there.

I love how the window mirror turned out!  It adds so much height to my fireplace wall and will be such a great backdrop for whatever I place on the mantle, which I'm still trying to decide...