Large Distressed Gear for Steampunk Costumes

I love steampunk, and I love the motif of gears. However the gears from the craft store are often to small in my opinion, also they look very new. If we go with actual antiques they can be very heavy and expensive, or if you harvest from an old watch they can be down right microscopic. So today I'm going to show you how I achieve a distressed metal look using cardboard, glue, and paint.

Oh, and FIRE.

1. Thin cardboard, like empty cereal boxes, cracker boxes, mac and cheese boxes

2. Tacky Glue

3. Black Acrylic Paint, I use the cheapest kind I could find at the store

4. Gold Acrylic Paint, I love the Martha Stewart Crafts Multi Surface Metallic in GOLD

5. At least 1 pin with a rounded end

6. Candle, mine was vanilla scented, which did make the gear smell of vanilla a little bit...

7. Lighter

8. A large flat paintbrush

9. A small pointed paint brush

10. Scissors

11. Gear template, I found mine on the internet and used powerpoint to size it to the size I wanted

12. A small container if you want the gear to be dull

Hope you have fun finding ways to use your new light weight distressed gear. My favorite thing about this project, beyond that's it's flexible, super cheap, and completely customizable, is that no one thinks it's cardboard, and their face is amazing when I show them the back of the gear.