How to keep your gourd’s natural look and add a warm shine is a post for new gourd artists learning basic techniques. Gourd grower and artist Gramham Ottoson and I provide tips on adding a warm shine to enhance your gourd’s natural appearance.
What if you dry off the gourd and find it looks beautiful in its natural state? The tones and blotches from the mold spots are great, so why cover them with paint? Do you need to add a finish? No, but doesn’t the shine from the water make it look great?
Graham Ottoson would agree with you! She loves making gourds, especially animals, out of gourds in their natural color. In this post, I will offer you my tips on products you can use and share Graham’s techniques for a simple way to make your gourds shine. Then, you can watch her demonstrate the process in a 16-minute video.
Graham Ottoson is the owner of Gourdlandia in Ithaca, New York. She gives classes there, grows gourds, and inspires us not to take gourd art too seriously! You will find her video delightful!
I want to begin with the products I like to use and the suggestions Gramham makes in her video.
Gramham’s Sequence for waxing a gourd
Step 1: Stain the Gourd
Use Ink Dyes for this process
Choosing a Gourd Dye
These two brands, Memories from Blue Whale Arts and Welburn Farms Gourd Dye, are alike. These are popular dyes used by most gourd artists because they are fade-resistant, streak-free, semi-transparent, water-based, and non-toxic. Here are the colors recommended for this process
Using a Heat Gun
Both brands need to be heat set. You might want to consider a lighter gun with less power. Graham says her’s may be too powerful. Check out these buys.
Preventing staining Everything Else!
These are dyes, so wear an apron, cover your work surface, and wear gloves. Gramham’s gloves are something I will buy. My extra tip is to keep a rag and spray bottle of 99% alcohol nearby for cleaning up spills.
Waxing Choices
Gramham is demonstrating shoe wax and shoe creams.
She likes using the shoe cream because it contains a mixture of wax and oil designed to penetrate and restore natural oils, helping to keep the gourd from cracking. Any shoe polish works, but she does prefer the Meltonian Shoe Cream. I usually use this Protecting Wax from Welburn.- in place of the shoe wax.
Now that I have explained your product choices, let’s go over the sequence of the process.
Step 1: Staining the Gourd
Wearing her gloves, she will now drop the brown and olive dye onto the surface, using equal amounts of each. They blend as she wipes in on it. You can blend all your colors until you get the desired color.
Step 2: Heat Set Dyes
Whenever you use gourd dyes, you must heat set it to help the dye soak into the gourd, and it helps prevent the fading of the color. Hold the gun close to the gourd and move quickly.
Step 3: Adding the First Layer of Shine
Now, while the gourd is still warm from the dryer, Gramham takes out a neutral color of shoe polish. She rubs on the polish using about ¼ teaspoon on a felt square. If you use too much, the gourd will stay taky. You can still change the color at this stage by adding a darker polish tone. This is essentially adding wax to the surface. I would be using the Protecting Wax at this point. But the show polish is a much cheaper way to go.
Lastly, buff the gourd with a rag that has a slight texture. Now that it is waxed, you do not want to heat it again. You might find the shoe polish has an odor. Besides, you have ventilation because it could be toxic
Step 4: Cream Cream layer
The next layer of Shine uses the Meltonian Cream.
Choose any natural tone because it doesn’t add color. Again, use a small amount. Briskly rub it on with your entire hand because it dries quickly. Buff it again until you get the shine you like.
That is the process. Simple yet effective for a gourd that will not be covered with paint.
I invite you to watch this 16-minute video and learn about Gramham and her extra tips.
If you want to see more of Gramham’s work and the fun events at Gourdlandia, read my post, The Gourd Lady of Gourdlandia. Also, please take a look at her website.
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