Turn Wall Art into a Coffee Table Tray

Turn a thrift store find wall art piece into a pretty coffee table tray using paint, vinyl, and ribbon.

For a budget friendly alternative to a decorative tray, don’t overlook thrift store items. Picture frames or wall art can be repurposed into pretty trays.

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I’ve always thought that you can’t have too many trays. While you can find some reasonably priced at stores like Home Goods or TJ Maxx, you can use thrift store finds to make them for lots less.

Coffee Table Tray Using Cricut

I’ve had this wall art piece in my craft stash for a while. I found it at my local Goodwill for less than $3. I forgot to take a photo of it before I got started on removing the paper image.

After pulling off as much of the paper as I could, I used a paint scrapper and water to remove the rest of it. Even though this will be the bottom of my tray I didn’t want to just paint over the paper image because it would likely peel away.

Once I had the paper removed, I used a piece of sand paper to smooth out the surface before giving it a coat of white paint. This base coat was followed with the same green that I used for the top.

When I bought this wall art, I liked how deep the back of it is. That’s when I had the idea to turn it into a tray. It had quite a few staples that had to be pulled out.

After pulling out the staples, I used more sand paper to smooth over the holes that were left.

Since I plan on using this on the coffee table in my sunroom, I wanted it to match a couple of furniture pieces that I’ve painted for that room like this Stenciled Coastal Spindle Table. The paint is Waverly Chalk Paint in Celery.

To cover the holes that were left from the staples, I searched through my ribbon stash to find some that would match and that was a good width for the tray. I cut two pieces for the ends, glued them on, and then cut two more pieces for the sides and glued them on top of the end pieces and onto the bottom.

The next part is the fun part of the project. Using Circut Design Space, I found a circular image of greenery (Image #M443337) and font for the R is called Friday. I resized the image and moved the R into position. Finally, I used the attach tool before cutting.

I’ve mentioned before that I prefer to use transfer paper instead of transfer tape for my Cricut Projects. I’ve found it’s much easier to work with.

To make sure I had the image centered, I measured before transferring to the tray.

The final step was to give it two coats, allowing for drying time in between coats, of DuraClear Gloss Varnish. I should have done the tray before adding the ribbon. Oops. So, the rims of the tray with ribbon didn’t get varnished.

Trays like this come in handy in lots of ways. I have it on a coffee table right now, but it would make a great addition to a bedroom for guests to use.

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Repurposed Wall Art into Decorative Tray

Supply List for Name of Project

• Thrift Store Find Wall Art
• Staple Puller
• Paint Scraper
• Chalk Paint
• Paint Brushes
• Ribbon
• Scissors
• Measuring Tape
• Hot Glue
• Sand Paper
• White Vinyl
• Cricut Machine
• Transfer Paper
• Gloss Varnish

What’s your latest thrift store find makeover?

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