Chalkboard Message Center

Featured Pro: Carter Oosterhouse
Category: Home Decor
Time: 2:29


CARTER OOSTERHOUSE: Hey, I’m Carter Oosterhouse, and this is another GMC Trade Secret.

Now, today I’m going to show you how to make a chalkboard message center that you can put up in your kitchen or your mud room. But it’s not going to be the typical one that you buy from the store.

Now, the first thing that you’re going to need is some chalkboard paint. You can get that any local hardware store. And the second thing you need is something to apply it to. Now, here I have an old drawer. Over here I have an old window. And here I just have a simple tray, or you can even use a dish of some sort. But the cool thing about this project is that you’re repurposing something and giving it new life.

So the first thing we want to do is apply the paint to this drawer. Before we do that, I’m going to prep it by putting blue painter’s tape around the inside so I don’t get the side walls.

All right. So now that all the interior walls are taped up, I’m going to go ahead and apply the chalkboard paint. Now, you’ll find out that this chalkboard paint is pretty heavy, but you still want to be really liberal and maybe even use two or three coats.

All right. So now that the paint is dry, let’s go ahead and take the tape off. All right. So now we have the tape off. Now, there are numerous ways that you can even hang it. I’m just going to simply take some screws and drill right through and make sure I hit a stud. Let’s go put it up.

All right. So now the drawer is secured to the wall. And a little tip – before you actually start writing on your chalkboard with your chalk, the first thing you should do is actually apply the chalk to the entire surface area from the side, just like this. Now completely cover the entire area and then just go back and erase it. And this will make it a lot easier to erase when you start writing stuff on here.

So you can find an old drawer, find an old window frame, and you too can make your own message center at home.

I’m Carter Oosterhouse, and that’s your GMC Trade Secret.