Six Recipes for making Chalk Based Paint (2024)

Do you have questions about chalk based paint and how to make your own? Need tips to save money on paint? Have you ever wanted to tint your own paint? Have you ever dipped your paintbrush in your coffee cup instead of your paint?

Read on…

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Chalk-Based Paint Recipes

I use the same recipe for all powders used to make homemade chalk-based paints.

The recipe is:

Add 2 tablespoons of lukewarm water to mixing bowl. Add 2 tablespoons of powder. Mix well. Very well. Add to one pint or 2 cups of paint. Mix very well.

For this post, I’m using flat white paint. I poured 1/3 cup into 6 mixing cups. Then added 1 teaspoon lukewarm water to another cup and added 1 teaspoon of powder. Mixed very well and added to the white paint.

Non-Sanded Grout

Non-sanded grout is in the tile section. Grout is to hold the tile in place and betweentiles. Make sure to grab the non-sanded it’s a fine powder. There is sanded grout to that contains sand. This was the first powder I ever used to make chalk type paint.

Plaster of Paris

Plaster of Paris is in most craft stores. In our small community, I had to order it online. Plaster of Paris is commonly used for making casts and molding. I’ve used it to create art blocks. It’s fun to use.

Chalk

Yep, you can use a piece of chalk to make chalk type paint. It’s not my favorite way because it’s hard to get a fine powder. Above I used a makeup sharpener and a hammer. Note: the powder above is not fine enough.

Baking Soda or Cornstarch

When I gathered my supplies for this post, I forgot the cornstarch. So cornstarch isn’t in the mix. But it does work okay, along with baking soda. Baking powder works too. I have to admit, I would rather use them in cookies than paint!

Talcum Powder

I’ve never tried to use talcum powder in paint…until today. It worked well, but like the cooking powders, it’s not my favorite.

What is Chalk powder?

Calcium Carbonate

Calcium carbonate is chalk powder. It’s the magic ingredient to chalk type paints…and my favorite to make homemade paint.

Above are the chalk-based paints with different powders mixed in. Sorta look the same.

But I believe they will perform differently. The powder from a piece of chalk is my least favorite, mainly because it’s hard to get a fine powder. Over the next few weeks, I will paint thrift store projects with each mix of paint to share with you.

Make sure you follow me to get updates on the results.

In the meantime, I did tint each one.

I used craft paint and my favorite tint in raw umber. Just add a little at a time to reach a color you like.

These chalk powders for paint were used to create this soft shabby chic vignette and the paintbrush bouquet!

A couple of Paint Tips

Buy a gallon of flat white paint in your favorite brand and a handy-dandy lid to seal your paint. I love this one because you see that tall spout? Well, it collapses down into the can so you can still stack your paint cans.

Why buy a gallon of boring white paint? First, it’s great to make homemade chalk-based paint. Second, you can easy tint small amounts for your thrift store projects. When I created home decor project to sell around local shops, I always have a gallon of flat white paint.

Note: If your project is a beautiful table you want to paint a specific color of blue, do have your paint tinted at the hardware store.

How many times do you have paint to mix but no paint sticks? Happens to me all the time. So I grab two skewers two to mix. Using two at the same time mixes almost twice as fast. Paint that’s sitting around for awhile, I use this to mix the paint.

Grab a cup of coffee and check out these related projects. 😀

Painting Furniture