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I had a wee little bud vase that a friend gave to me many years ago that fell off a shelf. Our mischievous cat knocked it over in the middle of the night and I was so sad when I found it broken.
The vase was special to me so instead of tossing it I thought I’d give the traditional art of kintsugi a try. Kintsugi is the Japanese method of repairing broken or cracked ceramics with gold dust mixed with lacquer or epoxy. It’s the practice of emphasizing scars instead of hiding them. I thought I’d give it a try to repair my little broken bud vase and now it’s perfectly imperfect in its repaired state.
Traditional kintsugi uses real gold in powder form but in my case I did a faux version using golden pigment powder and epoxy glue mixed together. You can buy DIY kits online using the same combination (see this kit and this kit). I simply bought a little container of gold pigment dust from Michaels and an epoxy glue as well, then mixed them together to create a golden glue to reattach the broken pieces together.
The supplies you need to do the same are pictured below: gold pigment powder, epoxy glue, small plastic container for mixing, small tip paintbrushes, mixing stick, and latex gloves.
The process is not complicated, it just takes a little patience. I painted on the golden epoxy with a little paintbrush and attached to no more than three pieces at a time so they could dry in larger segments which required that I mix the gold pigment dust and the epoxy in small amounts four separate times. I waited a full hour between sessions for the epoxy to fully bond before moving on to attaching additional segments together.
I’m posting a Reel on Instagram so you can see the process in a video since I didn’t take any in progress photos. I’m so happy with how it turned out, in fact I like the bud vase even more now. 🙂
Kintsugi is proof that broken things can be made more beautiful with a little love and attention. 🙂
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