Thrifted Light Box

I'm not really sure what the technical name for this is, but I'm calling it a light box.  Original right?  I think it was used for signs.  I found it for $3.99 while thrifting and immediately thought of the awesome DIY light up sign that Mandi from Vintage Revivals did.  I tested it to make sure it worked and it did.  I thought it would be a fun little addition to my daughters room.

As you can see from the picture, the plexiglass was scratched up pretty badly.  I had originally planned to paint the back of the plexiglass, but decided to paint the front instead to cover up the scratches and other marks.  If it didn't work I planned to just buy a replacement piece of plexiglass from Home Depot, but thankfully it worked which was great because it saved me around $15.

Anyways, I just unscrewed the top and removed the glass and that awful faux wood frame.  Even though it was gold already I spruced it up with a fresh coat of gold spraypaint to cover up some of the years of wear and tear.

Then, I sprayed the back of the plexiglass with frosted glass spray paint so it would have more of a soft glow.  I did about three coats.  

via

Then, I cut out the word "shine" using my silhouette machine.  You can make your own letters using vinyl and letter stencils.

I adhered my letters to the front side of the plexiglass since I planned to paint the front side.  If you were painting the back side you would need to mirror your letters and adhere them to the back side so that the word would be displayed correctly.

Then, I got excited and forgot to take pictures of the next few steps, but it's pretty self explanatory.  I primed the plexiglass with about 3-4 coats of primer.  I wanted it to be opaque so that the only light you would see shining through would be through the letters.  I decided to go with a pretty coral color to keep things bright and girly.   The color I used was behr juicy passionfruit.  I just bought a sample of it since I knew I wouldn't need much.  I used a foam roller to apply the paint to get a nice even finish.  You could also use spray paint, but the color I wanted wasn't available in spray paint form.  Once the paint was dry, I removed the vinyl letters.  There's something therapeutic about that, it's like removing all the painters tape when you're finished painting a room.

Fluorescent lighting isn't my favorite, but with the frosted glass you really can't even tell it's fluorescent.

I'm working on a DIY version that's super easy that I'll share soon.