Welcome to HGTV Handmade: A Creative Approach to Repurposing Cardboard Boxes

As we continue from our recent Tiki party series, today we're back to exploring various DIY projects that will help you reuse and recycle everyday materials. One of my personal pet peeves is seeing a giant stack of cardboard boxes sitting around, only to be carelessly thrown away without any thought for their potential reuse. To combat this issue, I've been brainstorming creative ways to repurpose old cardboard boxes into something new and useful. Today's project is all about transforming an old cardboard box into a beautiful hexagon tray that can be decoupaged onto to create a stunning design.

Choosing the Right Cardboard Box

The first step in creating your hexagon tray is to select a suitable piece of cardboard. Ideally, you'll want to choose a flat and solid piece of cardboard that's bigger than the size you want your tray to be without any folds or dents. However, I've had my fair share of dealing with imperfect cardboard pieces, and I learned how to work around them. When I didn't have access to a perfect piece of cardboard, I made do by folding over some sections and creating a makeshift tray. If you're like me and don't always have the best luck finding flat cardboard, this method can be a great alternative.

Drawing Out Your Shape

Now that we've got our cardboard piece ready, it's time to draw out your shape. For this project, I chose to make a hexagon-shaped tray, but feel free to experiment with different shapes like squares, pentagons, or octagons – the possibilities are endless! To create a hexagon, break out your math skills and protractor, and carefully measure and draw the angles that will give you your desired shape. For my larger tray, I measured 7 inches from the center, while my smaller tray measured 4 inches. Once you've completed your shape, use a craft knife and ruler to cut it out. If your hexagon happens to have a fold in it, don't worry! Just cut out another identical piece and glue them together for added reinforcement.

Cutting Out the Sides

With our hexagon shape ready, it's time to cut out the sides of your tray. Decide on the height you want your tray to be and draw out a grid of rectangles that will eventually become the sides of your tray. Make sure each rectangle is equal in size to the distance measured from the center, which should be consistent with your hexagon shape. Cut out six evenly sized rectangles, and then warm up your hot glue gun to start gluing them onto the sides of your hexagon.

Assembling Your Tray

With all six rectangles cut out, it's time to assemble your tray. Use your hot glue gun to attach each rectangle to the side of your hexagon, making sure they line up perfectly on the bottom. Don't worry if it feels a bit wobbly at first – we'll get to that later! For now, just focus on getting all the sides attached and secure.

Adding a Decorative Touch

Now that our tray is assembled, it's time to add some visual interest with decoupage. Choose your favorite patterned paper or napkins and carefully cut them into smaller pieces that fit snugly onto your tray. Apply a thin layer of Mod Podge to each piece, and then gently place them onto your tray. Make sure to smooth out any air bubbles or wrinkles as you go, using a credit card or similar tool if necessary.

Finishing Touches

Once all the decoupage is complete, let the Mod Podge dry completely before handling your tray. If you want to add some extra flair, now's the time to do it! You can apply a coat of white paint to the entire tray for a crisp look or use a contrasting color to create a pop of color.

Using and Displaying Your Hexagon Tray

Finally, our hexagon tray is ready to be used and displayed. While these trays are perfect for decorative purposes only, please avoid using them to carry heavy items, as they're made from cardboard and may not hold up well under weight.

Tips and Variations

* One thing I wish I had thought of earlier was painting the tray white before applying decoupage. If you find yourself working with a light-colored design, consider giving your tray a coat of white paint first to create a brighter, cleaner look.

* The Mod Podge does make some parts of the napkin pattern slightly transparent, which can give your tray a unique vintage feel.

* Feel free to experiment with different shapes, sizes, and colors to create a truly one-of-a-kind piece. Whether you choose bold patterns or soft pastels, this project is all about expressing your creativity!

And that's it for today's DIY tutorial on transforming old cardboard boxes into beautiful hexagon trays! With these simple steps and some creative flair, you can turn an everyday material into something extraordinary. Don't forget to check out my previous video on making cardboard hexagon shelves, and get ready to fill your entire room with stunning hexagons – thanks for watching, and I'll see you all next week!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhi everyone Karen here welcome back to HGTV handmade the last two weeks have been all about our Tiki party so definitely check those out if you haven't seen them yet but this week we are back to just normal DIYs so a problem that I have is that I really like to do my shopping online but then I hand up with this giant stack of cardboard boxes and I feel bad just throwing away so much cardboard all the time so I'm always trying to think of new DIYs that I can do to use up some of those boxes so today the project that I have for you is how to recycle an old cardboard box into a really cool hex lexicon tray that we're going to decoupage onto to make a really pretty design so the first thing to do is to choose your piece of cardboard ideally you'll have a piece of solid flat cardboard that's bigger than the size that you want the bottom of your tray to be without any folds or dents or anything like that now I did not have that I had to make my tray over a fold but ideally yours will be totally flat so now it's time to draw out your shape I'm going to be making a hexagon shaped tray but you could do a square a pentagon an octagon whatever shape strikes your fancy so to draw a hexagon just break out your math class protractor and draw some angles that are 60° extend those lines out and then measure up the same distance from the center for the larger tray that I made I measured up 7 in from the center and then for the smaller tray that I made I measured 4 in and then just connect those marks and you've got yourself a hex hexagon use a craft knife and a ruler to cut it out and then since my hexagon ended up with a fold in it I actually cut out a second hexagon and glued them together just to make it a little more reinforced but if your piece doesn't have a fold or you don't think your piece of cardboard needs it that step is totally optional so now it's time to cut out the sides just decide how tall you want them to be I made mine 2 in and then the length of each side should be equal to the distance that you measured from the center so mine is 7 in so just draw out a grid of rectangles and then cut them apart when you have six evenly sized rectangles warm up your hako gun and start gluing them to the sides of the hexagon make sure that they line up perfectly on the bottom so that your tray isn't all wobbly and the first one probably won't feel very secure but once you get the second one on there and you attach the two of them with a little bit of glue it'll feel a lot more sturdy and then the rest go on really easily and just one more tip use your finger to wipe away any excess Globs of hot glue because when we decoupage over it that'll just look kind of messy so once all of the sides are attached just use your hu lugan to fill in any gaps on the side or on the bottom which makes it a little more structurally secure and it also means that our decoupage isn't going to be dipping into those gaps so you could always just leave it like this or paint it or you could decorate it ever you want but I decided to decoupage some napkins onto it napkins actually take really well to mod podge and they come in all sorts of fun designs and they're really cheap so you can make two or three trays out of just one packet so the way that you decoupage is you just take your mod podge and you brush it onto the cardboard and then put your napkin in place and cover the entire thing with another coat of mod podge you can cut apart the napkins if you want to overlap the design lines a little bit more and just repeat this over the entire tray you should be generous with your Mod Podge to make sure everything is fully covered and not peeling up so either get a new container of mod podge for this project or just get a really big tub of it like I have so Pro tip if your tray ends up totally covered in wet glue and you can't really pick it up to work on the sides just put it on top of a couple cups to lift it up so that you can finish working on all of the sides and just kind of rotate it just work your way around the entire tray making sure you cover all of the cardboard and then once you have the entire thing covered you might just want to give it a second coat of mod podge just to really protect it so let it dry fully and then you're basically done for one final touch I added a bit of gold gilding paint along the top Edge to give it a little more shine but that step is totally optional so now you can put it on a side table or a coffee table or wherever you want just to give your stuff a little more visual interest and another pop of color you can make these in all sorts of sizes like this smaller one that I covered in magenta napkins to get this really cool texture one thing though these trays are only meant for display and should not be used to carry anything heavy it is made of cardboard not metal so I don't want you filling it up with a tray of drinks and trying to carry it and then have it like fold under the weight and it spills everywhere but if you just leave it as a decorative piece nobody will ever guess that you made it yourself out of old cardboard boxes so honesty hour here I do have one more step that I wish I had thought of to do if life had an undo button the Mod Podge does make the white spots on the napkin pretty transparent so there are some parts where you can see the brown cardboard through the napkins I don't mind it so much it kind of just makes the tray look vintage but it would have looked a bit brighter and a bit cleaner if I had painted the tray white before I started gluing so if you have white paint on hand and you're decoupaging a light colored design you might just want to learn from my mistake but I love how these trays came out and I hope you like them too let me know in the comments what shape you would make or what pattern you would want to put onto yours and if you want more cardboard hexagon goodness I actually made these cardboard hexagon shelves last year so you can watch that video next and then just fill your entire room with beautiful hexagons all right don't forget to press like And subscribe and I will see you all again with another DIY next week bye everyone\n"