Friday, February 13, 2015

Mapping It Out

The other day I was cruising around on Pinterest and came across the coolest idea. It was how to make your own pull down school map. I've wanted one of those forever but as you know they are crazy expensive. So last weekend when I was out shopping with my mom and I came across a big USA map I knew right away I was going to try this. Here is the map when I bought it
Nothing special, I think it came out of an atlas book. It had fold marks and was a bit yellowed with age. Cost was a whopping $6.00. Perfect! Here is how it turned out
Awesome right? 
Now the blog I found this on has an excellent step by step tutorial on how to make this. You can find it here http://ourvintagehomelove.blogspot.com/2012/04/vintage-map-new-bed-and-little-guys.html?m=1
She does a great job and I pretty much followed it step by step. The only thing I had to purchase for this project was gloss Mod Podge . You need to use the gloss, not the matte, it gives it a little shine and a more authentic look. I mod podged both sides of my map to make it a little sturdier. For the poles I used a closet pole for the top and an old broom handle for the bottom. Both found in my garage. The poles were cut down to the same size (mine were 54" long) and then I spray painted them with Oil Rubbed Bronze by Rustoleum (also had on hand).
 She added caps to the end of her poles but I didn't have any so I skipped that step. I may add them later because it does look better with them. 
To hang it I added this wide cloth string with a brass tack. 
You attatch the map to the poles with heavy duty Velcro strips. The only thing I wish I had done different was on the bottom pole I should have put the Velcro on the back side of the map instead of the front. You can kind of see the Velcro but it's not that noticeable. I also added some tape strips on the back between the Velcro strips so it wouldn't gap out. Does that make sense? 
So there you have it. My very own faux pull down map for under $10.00! I love, love, love how it turned out. Bonus, it is a quick project.  Took me 2 hours start to finish. Which  is about how much patience I have so that worked out well.
Whatcha  think?

5 comments:

  1. I think it turned out awesome, now I have to go looking for a map. I used to have a collection of national geographic maps but I got rid of them all and I am now kicking myself :(

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  2. Excellent! I have a giant map that I want to sell, but I have never figured out how to display it - now I DO!!!! Where are you going to put it?? It's great.

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  3. I love old maps!! My husband and I have been super lucky in the map arena! We have purchased, not one, not two, not three, but four pull down maps!!!! And the most we have paid for one was $20. We sold two of them for over $300!!!!!

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    1. OMG! I would love to find one that was fairly cheap, let alone three! Lucky girl!

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