Catherine Carton shares her creative approach to DIY

We bring you the crafting secrets of the homegrown queen of upcycling and interiors blog Dainty Dress Diaries 

Catherine Carton gives an old bureau the upcycling treatment with dramatic decoupage.

I'm reading a new book with sustainability credentials offering multiple chances to creatively vamp up the gaff in the process, involving minimal cost, if any.

Written by Catherine Carton, our home-grown queen of DIY, upcycling, and make do and mend, she’s made it all nice and easy for us to grasp so far on her YouTube channel, Dainty Diaries, where 225,000 of us follow her, and on her Instagram, Dainty Dress Diaries, where 85,000 track and imitate her DIY crafting escapades.

An old bureau gets the upcycling treatment with dramatic decoupage.

It’s also where she introduces us to her particular interior style of shabby chic but which is actually “shabby-free”, focusing, instead, on the more pristine aspects of the look — florals, whites, creams and palest pastels — and on her love of the cupán tae, a topic where her Dublin loyalties falter in favour of the Rebel County’s favourite tea brand.

Her first book, Dainty Dress Diaries: 50 Beautiful Homecrafting Projects to Awaken Your Creativity (O’Brien Press €19.99), is especially good for those who believe they haven’t a creative or practical DIY-related thought in their head.

CLIMATE & SUSTAINABILITY HUB

How’s this for an idea? Vintage cups and saucers become bird feeders with the help of a drill and some string.

Catherine soothes and encourages, saying, “When I was in my 20s, I was lucky enough to purchase my own house. There wasn’t much cash left in the kitty so I began upcycling, recycling and using whatever I had to create my dream home which led me to start sharing my projects on a blog, Dainty Dress Diaries.

Craft a bath shelf to hold all your bits and pieces when you want the home spa feel.

“I put my hand to almost every material and tool you can think of. The thing with creativity is, once you start, you can’t stop. As Maya Angelou said, ‘You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.’”

On the cover we find her dolled up in one of her signature dainty floral dresses holding a china mug of tea, so it’s hard to imagine her getting out power tools and paint stripper to transform a clapped-out household item.

But she does, and for the DIY-shy, she makes it so approachable that I developed notions of upcycling a clapped-out old tall-boy with too much sentimental value attached to despatch to the charity shop.

I had already seen her YouTube making a summer bar for her garden, and how she repaired and installed an old glasshouse for her gardening escapades, then getting busy at the sewing machine to run up a string of bunting, before heading back to the garden for a mulching session.

So, daydreams ensued of applying ambitious paint finishes, a decoupage feature and some groovy new door handles to transform my dreary tallboy into a retro wonder until courage failed me as a novice.

How about a new project making scented candles in old tin cans to give as gifts or for burning on the patio this summer?

Timidly flicking to page 20 of her book I found safety in a recipe for Sweet Night’s pillow spray, a combo of relaxing lavender, ylang-ylang, frankincense and cedarwood now scenting the spare room. Result.

FLUSHED with this early but modest success, I moved on to instructions for making a string of bunting.

Not something I have a need for routinely, but I seized the opportunity to deploy my severely neglected sewing machine and a wodge of chintzy fabric which stares me in the face every time I open the hot press. I was also inspired by Catherine who had bunting high on her list of items she wanted to make when she did sewing classes.

“I loved the idea of having floral bunting in my cottage kitchen,” she says.

“It’s timeless. You can use it for parties and celebrations or leave it hanging in a sheltered spot in your garden. You can recycle old material or use your favourite patterned fabric for this project.

“Cotton and poly-cotton are best as they are easy to wash, so you can reuse them year after year.”

Carefully crafting a template according to Catherine’s instructions, I turned out uniform triangles of fabric but my inexperience with the sewing machine meant a few were crookedly sewn.

To put a spin on it, I think I’ll pass them off as irregular tetrahedrons, or hang them so high they’re saved from scrutiny, while I move on swiftly to the next project: scented candle-making in tin cans, while wishing I had this little treasure of a book for getting to grips with DIY during the long months of lockdown.

• Dainty Dress Diaries, 50 beautiful home-crafting projects to awaken your creativity, O’Brien Press €19.99), available for purchase from May 16, 2022
• instagram.com/daintydressdiaries
• youtube.com/c/DaintyDiaries