How to Copper Leaf a Pumpkin | Fall Farmhouse Decor
Have you ever wanted to learn how to use a metal leaf? Today I am going to show you how to copper leaf a pumpkin for some fun fall farmhouse decor. Guess what, it’s really easy!
Find Step by Step Instructions and A Video Below
Fall Farmhouse Home Decor
Fall is one of my favorite seasons. I love the way the sky starts to look different, it becomes brighter and clearer and the clouds are just beautiful.
Then the weather starts to cool off a bit, and it just really makes me want to do a little fall cleaning and then start decorating my home by bringing in some of the beautiful color and bounty of the harvest season.
This year the sky did its thing, but the weather just kept hovering around in the 90’s for what seemed like a really long time.
I was seriously unmotivated to decorate my home for fall. But I always love a good DIY project.
Copper Leaf Pumpkins
I decided that I wanted to go mostly neutral for my fall decor this year adding in some blue and copper.
Copper seems to be the perfect way to add simple fall touches throughout a home.
It seemed that copper pumpkins would be a great addition to my copper collection.
While I was shopping my house and gathering up items that I wanted to use I came up with the idea to copper leaf some faux pumpkins.
I thought they would look great with the other copper items that I wanted to use.
I feel like the copper leaf pumpkins can really transform your fall decor from average to exciting.
Look how much warmth and glow the copper leaf adds to a simple cheap faux pumpkin.
Even though the copper leaf pumpkins seem warm and inviting, I think the reflectiveness of the copper leaf gives off a lighter feeling, not heavy like harvest decor can sometimes seem.
Maybe light and airy is what I needed for my decor this year since it is still so hot here in south Louisiana.
DIY Copper Leaf Pumpkin Project
Pumpkins = Fall, so does that mean that copper leaf pumpkins might be the perfect fall farmhouse DIY project?
In the past, I have done quite a few projects with gold leaf sheets, so I knew that a copper leaf pumpkin DIY was very doable.
I started researching supplies and realized that making copperleaf pumpkins would also be a pretty inexpensive DIY project. Easy and inexpensive sounds good to me.
This ended up being one of my all time favorite pumpkin crafts.
Supplies you will need to make your Copper Leaf Pumpkins
- Pumpkins -you can use real or faux, I choose to use the faux ones so I can use them again next year. Mine are small pumpkins, but you could also do larger ones.
- You will need an old paintbrush or foam brush to apply the adhesive to your pumpkin
- You will need adhesive, a little goes a really long way so you just need a small container. You may need a larger container if you are doing larger pumpkins or a lot of pumpkins. I used this one.
- And of course metallic leaf, I used this inexpensive substitute for real copper leaf.
- I also covered my work area with a piece of parchment paper to make clean up easier.
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Handy Tip
If you are not parchment paper user you need to try it. Parchment paper is great to use for crafts to make clean up much easier.
Steps to Make a Copper Leaf Pumpkin
The process to making a copper leaf pumpkin is pretty easy but there is a small learning curve so just have fun with it.
Step 1. First apply your adhesive to your little pumpkin. You can use a foam brush or old paintbrush to do this step.
Apply a light thin coat, it will go on milky looking but it turns clear and shiny when it is ready to use.
Step 2. When the sized area is clear, shiny, and a little sticky, pick up a copper leaf sheet using the tissue paper that comes with that sheet.
Step 3. Begin to apply the leaf to your pumpkin at the top, letting it fall down along the side of the pumpkin.
The copper gilding sheets are very thin layers, so they can be difficult to work with for the first time. You will get the hang of it pretty quickly, and it is very forgiving, so don’t stress out!
Step 4. After all of your leaf is applied to your pumpkin, burnish it by rubbing lightly, using the tissue paper that comes with the copper leaf.
This really smooths it out and makes it look beautiful.
Use any excess leaf that falls off while you are burnishing to fill in the little missed spots.
You may want to cover all of the areas of the pumpkin or leave some uncovered like I did on some of mine.
If you are using a painted pumpkin this can look really nice.
I like seeing those hints of color peaking out of the shiny copper pumpkins.
Step 5. I painted my stems with American Paint Company paint in the color expresso. You don’t have to do this step but I felt it gave the stems more of a realistic look.
To see all of these steps in action watch my video, it will make the process so much easier to understand.
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Substitutions For This Pumpkin Craft
- Instead of making copper leaf pumpkins you can use these same instructions to make silver leaf pumpkins or real gold leaf pumpkins.
- If using faux pumpkins you can spray paint them different colors before the gilding process if you want certain colors to show through.
- You can use a dark brown paint with a dry brush to tone down your gilded pumpkins if they are to shiny for your liking.
- You could also use a white wax or a dark wax over your pumpkins to tone the color.
I really had fun with this DIY copper leaf pumpkin project, I hope you will give it a try. If you do be sure to let me know in the comments!
You might also like this post: Vintage Farmhouse Finds
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I love this. I have used leafing but not in copper and think this is prettier than the spray paint I’ve used in the past. Next year’s idea.