Giving Glass Bottles A Chippy Cement Look

I know everyone has at least one glass bottle lying around so I thought I would show you an easy way to get them to look like chippy cement without having to use cement. I’ve always wanted to try something like this so I just came up with my own method with things that I had on hand. I showed how I completed it on my IG stories one day and had a lot of inquires later after my stories erased. I’m going to give you the basic low down right here and add some affiliate links of where you can find supplies and where I found some of my room decor (complete source list at end of post). I started with bare clear liquor bottles like this…

I removed all of the labels after letting them soak in hot water for 30 minutes. I took the side of a fork and scraped off each label and then dried them. The stickiness that was remaining, I rubbed off with a paper towel dipped in a mixture of equal parts baking soda and olive oil…worked great! I know Goo Gone and other products work great too, I just didn’t have any on hand so I used what was in my cupboard. I then took them outside and sprayed them with an oil based primer. This helped the paint that I used later to stick better. It’s ok if they are not completely covered with primer, meaning the oil based primer does not have to be thick, just covered enough to adhere to all areas of the glass.

Once the bottles were all dry, I brought them inside and spread spackle all over them in different areas. I wanted some places to be more prominent than others so I just made it thicker in those places. As you can see, my bottle here has a name on it and I didn’t want that to show so I made the spackle thick enough in that area to cover it. I then let them dry in front of a fan. After they were dry I took them outside and sanded them a little with 100 grit sand paper, being careful to not scrape the spackle all the way off.

When I was done sanding them, I wiped the dust off with a dry rag and began to dry brush them. I will quick explain what dry brushing is but there are probably many tutorials out there for you to watch for a more in depth explanation. I took a cheap brush and dipped it in my paint and then wiped most of the paint off on a paper towel so the paint was not thick, letting the under coat show through a little when painted on my bottle. I brushed it back and forth all over the bottle with Valspar Pure White, let it dry, and then with a grey color from Valspar as well called Cliffside. These were just sample paints in satin finish that I had on hand but you could use any white and light grey color. Using alternate colors helps the paint to look multidimensional in color and more rustic. When I had the look I wanted on the bottle, I let it dry and then used 100 grit sand paper to start roughing it up a little. Don’t sand too hard or it will sand all of your spackle off. Since the spackle is white, when I sanded off the paint, the spackle would show through and make the bottle look chippy. Yay!! Just how I wanted it! How much you sand is preference of how you want your bottle to look.

And that’s it! I love how they turned out and they make great coffee table decor pieces! I had some people ask me where to get glass bottles and just a suggestion…you could place an add on your local yard sale site that you are “in search of” and many people probably throw these out every week in the trash. I can’t wait to see all of your cement glass bottle creations! Have a wonderful day and happy painting!