Art Challenge: Painting Wine Glasses

These days many of us need a way to keep ourselves occupied and engaged with activities. Art can provide so many benefits: it opens up the imagination and widens your eyes in a way that helps you be more observant, it provides a much needed distraction from the usual thoughts bouncing around our brains, and most importantly, at this moment, it can help reduce stress. Whether you have artistic inclinations or not, the act of creating is a journey, and the path you take on that artistic adventure has many perks, all which far outweigh the outcome of the process.

So let’s go on a journey to our kitchen cabinets and pull out some old glasses, you know, the ones in the back of the cabinet that you hardly ever use; they could be wine, champagne, martini, pint, or just plain old drinking glasses. Grab some permanent markers (or order a set of glasses and markers online) and follow along with Charles in the video below. Even if you don’t typically paint or draw, you can relax and draw what comes to mind here, there is no right or wrong way to decorate your glasses, and this tutorial is designed to let you make changes quickly and easily. Get ready to watch…

Video Transcript

Hi Everybody. I’m Charles Fazzino.

Nice to see everybody and thank you for watching my new video.

I just first want to say to everybody out there, all my fans in different countries, it’s been a very difficult time, and it’s been very difficult for me and for us here in New York City. As everyone knows, we’ve had a really hard time with this and everybody’s isolating, everybody’s home. I’m here at my studio alone. I have been creating and really getting a lot accomplished, believe it or not, because what else am I going to do but paint. I’m an artist and I’ve been very lucky that I’ve been able to leave my home, which I am completely isolated, and get to my car, get here to an empty building. It’s very quiet, I have my music playing and I am just trying to create. That’s what I wanted to get to. It’s all about creative and being creative. This is the time during a crisis like this, that if you’re bored at home and have nothing to do, what else is better than a craft project.

So I thought what I would do is start off with something that I did in the year 2000, when the new century was coming in. I bought glasses, champagne, wine glasses, and martini glasses, and I decorated them, and then wrapped them up and then gave them out to friends and family and coworkers as a gift. And I was thinking about that. What could everybody do at home that you have at the house right now that you could just take out of your cabinet or order it online, and order some markers online. And the markers I’m about to show you are markers that you may have in your house or your kids may have in a drawer someplace, but I’m gonna show you something that really is cool.

I want to start off to show everybody what we are going to be doing. It’s a wine glass, and I’ve decorated them with special type of markers. And they really look beautiful. You can see the designs on the glass. So what you’ll first do is, you can either order some, I bought Lenox wine glasses online and they come 6 to a box, 4 to a box. You don’t have to spend a lot of money, these were very inexpensive, their beautiful quality. The wine glasses actually have a beautiful sound to it. If you don’t have the time to order them online or you don’t have the capacity to do that, you may have some just champagne glasses or wine glasses in your cabinet that you can just take out. Make sure they are washed and dried really well.

Markers I am gonna show you are markers I’ve been using for many, many years. They’re called Deco Colors, they’re by Uchida and Marvy. They are markers that are completely washable, so when you use them on glass, they won’t come off. They last for a long time. I don’t really know if you would put them in the dishwasher, but you can hand wash them. The markers come in all sorts of colors, you see I have so many of them. There’s many places where you can order them online. You can just Google the words Deco Color or Marvy markers, indelible markers, that are permanent and opaque. These markers you can get at Durable Supply Company. I have nothing to do with the company, but it’s some place that I order from. And you can order them online and have them shipped to you. That is what I would do first is order some of these markers this way and you can then use them for many other projects. One marker will last to do so many glasses, it’s really quite amazing.

So once you have your glass, you would just take a marker and hold it on a very dry glass that is clean and just draw shapes. And that would be a good start. What looks really nice on these are just shapes. Confetti and it’s something we can all draw. You can start off with stars. You can do hearts. And I use these shapes all the time to decorate frames that I do for Super Bowl for the All-Star game.

And a trick I use sometimes because sometimes it’s hard to see so you can take a paper towel and stuff the paper towel inside the glass. By doing this you can see the design better as you’re drawing it. So you take your marker and you keep continuing to do your shapes. And what I try to do is to come up with a balance when you’re doing your designs and shapes. And you want to kind of balance the design all over the glass. And keep trying different colors, different shapes. Squares, hearts, triangles, is one of my favorite things to draw. And you notice how these markers are just beautiful colors. They take to the glass really really easy. Another thing that really looks good are trails of dots. And I use that as a signature on all my baseballs that I draw for Major League Baseball, on helmets, trails of dots really look good. I sometimes feel that I’m Bob Ross. He is always talking about happy clouds when he used to work in his studio. But like I said, you do not have to be an artist. You can fill in your squares and geometric designs that you’re doing.

Now I know you’ve seen them in department stores. I mean, this is something that you don’t have to buy. This is really a fun project. And I have to tell you as I’m doing them, you get the sense of relaxation. And that’s one of the best parts about this is how relaxing it is when you do this. Because of this whole Corona virus fiasco, my wife couldn’t get alcohol sheets, they were all sold out. So she made her own. She took some baby wipes and then added alcohol to them. The reason why I also use them at the studio besides for disinfecting is if you make a mistake you can take the alcohol and give it a little rub and the artwork comes off. The marker can be taken off with these alcohol rags. And I continue to use them because it also keeps my hands clean. At the end of drawing for the whole day, I’m a mess.

If you get tired of just doing squiggles, you can really get creative with doing cloud formations and just taking the marker and doing shapes that look like this. And those are really interesting to do. And you just keep changing the colors of your markers. Keep twirling the glass, holding it. You can even do things like this, anything around the house that helps you to secure the glass. And this way you can just keep turning it because it takes a certain amount of dexterity to be able to hold the glass. So anything you can get in your house to stabilize the glass could help. You know like something like that and then continue to do your designs. Now I usually don’t do the designs up to the top, why, because it is a marker and you don’t want that on your lips.

Something we use the N95 masks and you know everybody today is using them because of the Corona thing so if you do have one in the house, because smell bothers you, because it does cure with some type of xylene I think it’s called, sometimes it smells bad so you can put on your N95 mask and we use that here at the art studio and my daughter spray paints with it and it filters out all the impurities of the paint and of course it works for viruses as well.

And then you can even do something that looks like maybe you want to do like rays of light coming out using yellow. It’s just a zig zag design but it really looks great. Maybe around the bottom of the glass, you can turn the glass. And just take your marker and go all the way around the perimeter.This is something that we can all do. And that’s what these projects are about. And the more you do, the better they get. And I find that when I first start doing the glasses, the first one is sort of eh not that great. But as I continue to do them, they get better and better. Many of them I’ve decorated with an apple design cause I am here in NY and everyone knows me as the New York artist.

Sometimes I’ll do, which is a great idea, is a meandering vine design and that is just leaves on a design like this. And you can have leaves coming off of it. And you can be as elaborate as you want. And bring the vine coming down. As you come down and then take a lighter color green for the vine and fill in the leaves. And you can see the design very well and then continue with an up and down motion to get little dots in one place. As I said I call them trails of dots. We do a couple of charity events every year and I decorate my frames and it really enhances the artwork.

These markers are just incredible. And as I said if you didn’t hear earlier the company that I get these from are Durable Supply company. They are in Nashville and they ship online. Prices are quite reasonable. And I think the markers probably cost about, as I recall around 2.99 each. And they come in a whole host of colors and it’s important that you get a lot of colors because that is what is going to make it look interesting. But let’s say you have in your home, your house is all black and white, why not do black, white silver, grey. I do some glasses that are just in those color schemes and they look beautiful.

Another design I like to draw is music staff, and you can just do five lines, continuous lines in a balanced, even and draw your musical staff and musical notes around it, and that’s such a great thing because when this is over, we are all going to celebrate.

And then at the end of each vine you can go back in. And the reason why I keep moving around the glass, you have to give the paint time to dry in one place so you don’t want to just keep drawing in the same place, you keep moving the glass and turning it and moving around because this way as you move around the artwork doesn’t get all mish moshed. Making up new words here. And then you can go back in once the outside is dried and come back in and fill in these squiggles and squares and triangles with a different color. And then of course many times I’ll even decorate the stem. You can take the stem and do designs. When you work on the stem it’s important you are not holding the glass, because if you hold it at the stem you are going to make a mess, trust me I’ve made a mess. But that is what your alcohol is for, you can clean off your area.

Also what works very very well is you have any WD40 that is like the perfect thing to take off the paint. Just spray a little a qtip and then take the WD40 and I will show you the can and what it looks like. And you take a little of the WD40 and you spray on it. Let’s do it with red. You got some paint and you made a mess and you don’t like the way it looks, take some WD40, spray a little on here. Now this won’t come off, you can wash it with soap as much as you want it’s not gonna won’t come off. You take the WD40 and it’s like magic. You can clean off the whole glass if you want and start again. You never have to feel like oh I made a mess. It doesn’t look good, nobody is gonna like the glass, just clean it up. The only thing that is important is it leaves this grease residue, so it’s important you clean it really well, wash it with soap and water. This way you can continue, cause if you start to draw on it, it won’t adhere to it so that’s important.

Then you just keep continuing and this is what they look like. I don’t know if you can see them this well in the light but I think they look fabulous. Give them about, I don’t know. 30 minutes to completely dry before you put wine in them. But what I would do is wash them then, hand wash them with just a little bit of soap and water. And then they’re ready to use. They’ll stay forever, you don’t have to spray them, there’s nothing for you to do. They are finished and this is a really cool craft project.

Guys stay safe out there and I hope to see all my collectors and friends and pals in all the countries that I go to and let’s hope that we can do it soon. Take care.

Recap

Here is a step-by-step recap of how to paint wine glasses:

What You Will Need

• Glasses: wine, champagne flutes, martini, pint, water, etc.
• Permanent markers
• Painter’s tape
• Paper towels
• Alcohol
• Object to support the glass
• Open window or N95 mask (if the fumes bother you)

Steps

• Wash glasses with soap and water.
• Dry glasses completely with a paper towel or drying towel.
• Use painters tape to mask off the top ½” of the glass so the design doesn’t end up close to where your mouth will be.
• Start your design.
  • Some ideas to help get the process going:
    • Write down the marks you want to make on your glass.
    • Draw on a piece of sketch paper or print out a design from your computer you want to use.
  • Marks you can make:
    • Shapes like circles, squares, or triangles.
    • Shapes like hearts, stars, squiggles, or swirls.
    • Meandering designs like vines, training dots, or confetti.
  • Use colors to create depth in your design:
    • Use lighter or darker colors to fill in shapes.
    • Go monochromatic with blacks, whites, and grays.
  • Make sure to keep moving around your glass so the markers have time to dry. You can also experiment with mixing marker colors together but keep in mind, your marker tips will get contaminated that way.
  • Use alcohol wipes or WD-40 to remove any mistakes or make changes to the marks you have created.
• Let the markers set. Wait about 30 minutes to ensure the markers are completely dry.
• Wash glasses with soap and water.
• Pour your wine, or beverage of choice and enjoy your design.

Other Ideas for Painting Wine Glasses

You might have some of these things laying around the house so feel free to grab them to help with your painted wine glass creation:

• Use stencils for patterns, objects, or lettering. You can also get self-adhering stencils. Make sure the marker is completely dry before peeling the stencil off the surface of the glass.
• Mask with painter’s tape for straight lines or creating patterns.
• Print out artwork, patterns, letters which you can drop inside the glass to be able to trace and mirror on the glass itself. You can tape the design to the glass and stuff with paper towels, a towel, rag, or socks to hold the design against the glass.
• Add stick on crystals, or other embellishments you might have from other projects. Note: The markers will last forever but other embellishments may pop off over time. Be extra careful when washing them.
• Use stamps by coloring the marker on the stamp and then transferring it to the glass (you will have to move quickly while the paint is still wet).
• Consider a theme like animals, flowers, sports, or quotes and design a wine glass set that goes together.
• Get your holidays gifts done early this year and do something creative all at the same time.
• The kids can get involved with this project too. Ask them what shapes to make or recreate one of their pieces of artwork on a glass.
• Once you have finished your glass, consider using these for decoration rather than for drinking.
  • Pop a candle inside and light up a room.
  • Add snacks like nuts, olives, or candies and use to decorate a table for a party.
  • Add water and bamboo or flowers so it can serve as a vase.

We hope you will enjoy this art challenge as much as we do. Thank you for watching. You can check Fazzino Art Lessons for other ideas for creating at home. Stay safe and healthy everyone!