1. Design Your Decoration

First, you'll need to come up with your decoration. I started working on my design with two things in mind. In terms of execution, I wanted to keep the design fairly simple. I figured fine detail would probably not be visible, would be difficult to paint, and would be more likely to break. Not fun. Secondly, I also wanted my decoration to be fairly square to match the face of the rosette. You certainly could do shapes with more or less than a 1:1 height/width ratio, but I felt that target would look best. Personal opinion.

Creating my own design from scratch is something I intend to do as I finish different rooms. However, for my first attempt, I wanted to see results sooner rather than later. So, I turned to Google Image Search. In this case I was looking for a lion like you'd find on a coat of arms. Searching for "lion heraldry" and filtering on a license that would allow me to share and modify eventually led me to the Macedonian lion by MacedonianBoy. It had a bit more detail than was practical, but I was able to simplify while keeping my favorite lines. Bottom line, searching can help you find good designs.

2. Cut the Design From Wood

Next, I scaled the image to a size that would fit well on my rosette blocks and printed it. I then used carbon paper to trace the major elements to a piece of 1/4" poplar. Note: This is a good time to leave out any details that may be too fine. Now take the wood to a scroll saw and cut it out. It is OK to leave a bit of extra wood, especially on the detail areas. Any extra can be more delicately removed in the next step, filing the edges. I used a set of needle files to smooth the edges and take off any extra material left from the saw.

3. Paint

After filing the edges, I primed and painted the decoration. I matched my trim color to make the decoration subtle, but I can imagine scenarios where you'd want different colors to make the decoration pop a bit more. Your call.

4. Install

Finally, I was able to install my decoration. I used hot glue to attach the lion to a painted, installed rosette block. I went with hot glue because I plan to eventually build up an inventory of these designs and swap them over time. Hot glue should allow me to pop off the decoration with minimal damage. But use whatever glue is right for you.

5. Enjoy

So there you have it. As promised, I think I've put the "custom" in custom molding with these personalized rosette decorations. I really like the possibilities; you could do food-themed designs in the kitchen, toy designs for kids, and on, and on.

I was originally concerned about the 1/4" wood thickness, but found it casts a nice shadow. Any thinner, and I might have needed to contrast the paint a bit.

No idea what my next project write-up will be or when (pushing almost two year since I first wrote about the custom moldings.) You may want to just subscribe to the ATOM feed if you want to be alerted when I eventually do post again.