Mosaic Sun Makeover

This large pottery & metal sun has been hanging on the front of my garage for many years. The bright sunshine had faded the pottery so much it began to blend in with the siding itself and just didn’t have the same eye-catching effect as when it was new.  And the rain had caused the metal rays to begin to rust a bit.  I decided to try giving it some new life with a mosaic makeover. Mosaic tile can be quite costly, and I was going to need a lot, so I decided to try something else. Off to the local dollar store I went, where I bought lots of colorful, glazed, pottery plates (similar to Fiesta Ware). The finished piece is definitely more eye-catching and gives the pop of color I was looking for.

 

The first step for my makeover was to spray the metal rays of the sun with a dark metallic Rustoleum paint to seal them and prevent further rusting.

To break the plates into individual mosaic pieces, place a heavy towel on a hard surface (cement, tar, or even a large flat rock). Place the plate inside, and fold the towel over the top to prevent pieces from scattering.  Wearing safety glasses would be a good idea. Grab a hammer and get whacking. You can hit areas needing to be broken into smaller pieces again if needed. Also note that the resulting pieces can be quite sharp, so use caution when handling.

Then I simply used a mosaic adhesive from the local home improvement store to mount them over the face of the sun.  Grout from the home improvement store was used to fill in the areas between the tiles once the adhesive was fully dry.