Creating a Believable Persian Rug

Years ago, I read somewhere about how to make a miniature Persian rug. The instructions said, "Start with a magazine page or advertisement of a Persian rug." I found a good photograph of one from a Southern Living magazine and used it for my Scrooge! roombox, pictured above.

It's simple to make the rug, actually. You'll need the picture, of course, plus a can of semi-gloss Deft spray varnish, one ply of a facial tissue, some grosgrain ribbon and a little bit of glue. Trim the photo to the exact dimensions of the carpet. Next, lay it down on a surface that can be heavily doused with Deft varnish. Spray it once to seal the picture. Let it dry.

Most facial tissues are two ply. If you tease it apart, you'll get a very thin piece of tissue paper. Most likely, it will have a bad crease through the middle. You'll need to steam iron it carefully to flatten the tissue.

Once your tissue is prepped, go back and heavily spray the Persian rug again with the Deft. Carefully lay the tissue down onto the rug and pat it gently into place. Do your utmost best to make sure any little wrinkles are smoothed out. Now spray it again until the entire surface is heavily soaked with the Deft. If any bubbles form beneath the tissue, use a pin to pop these out and make sure you see no white tissue that is standing up from the surface of the rug.

Let it dry. You'll now have a much softer tone quality to the picture of the carpet. Take a piece of grosgrain ribbon and cut it the length of the end of the carpet. Then trim the edge off one side of the entire length of the grosgrain ribbon and fray the ribbon by removing the threads. You'll now have a beautiful piece of fringe. (This technique works on draperies, too!) Glue the fringe to your rug, and you now have your Persian rug.