Make a Resin Art Geode with Epoxy Resin in 9 steps!
A geode or druse is a hollow, or partially hollow, stone that is covered with crystals on the inside. Real geode's are very expensive. With epoxy casting resin you can easily make one yourself completely to your own wishes! Hi artists, hobbyists and creatives! My name is Jessica Immen-van Ophem, 38 years old. As an artist I make many colorful things such as: paintings for inside and outside, resin art geodes, pyramids and tables, art cards with beeswax, clay goddesses, dream catchers and jewelry with gemstones. You can read all about what I do and make on mywebsite ,FacebookandInstagram .
Making geodes is a popular activity within the resin art community. And for good reason, because they are super beautiful and fun to make. You can compare them to agate slices. These are real gemstone slices that consist of band patterns in different shades. Think of the rings of a tree slice, but then more irregular and in an oval shape. And have you ever seen a real amethyst geode? These are large gemstones that you can put down: with a rock crystal edge and a hollow interior full of shiny purple crystals.
They are beautiful and therefore a great inspiration to make with epoxy resin, colors and glitters. How cool to make something like this yourself! Hang it on the wall or put it in a sturdy stand with your gemstone collection. I will soon show you how I made this beautiful geode. And in real life it is even more beautiful :)
Make sure you have all the supplies you need and that you are going to work on a flat, stable surface. You don't want the resin to run out. You can measure this with a spirit level or a spirit level app for a mobile phone.
Step 2. Making the Geode Base
Draw the shape of a geode of your choice on a sheet of plywood and saw it out. Mine is about 30x40cm in size. You will pour the resin on this later and this will be your geode. Sand it all around. Clean it with a little water and a degreasing agent such as ammonia.
Step 3. Painting the base
Place the board on e.g. 4 cups so that it is off the ground. Check if it is level. Then color the wooden board with acrylic paint. The inside white and the outside black. On a white background, the colors of epoxy resin that you will pour later will stand out better. Black makes the color darker and I wanted to make the outer edges dark with this geode. Take a look at the photo above of the end result if you don't quite understand it. Dry the paint with a hair dryer or let it dry for a day before continuing.
Step 4. Mixing the epoxy resin
In the previous step we sawed and painted a geode shape from wood. Now we are going to mix the epoxy resin. Put on your gloves and watch your clothes! We are going to use the 2 component epoxy resin from itsOkay . In total about 250/300ml for a wooden plate of 40x30cm. Take a scale and put a mixing cup on it. We start with the first layer. Make sure the resin is at room temperature. Weigh 40ml. So 20ml of both bottles, because this epoxy resin is in proportion 1 to 1. Stir it well with a wooden spatula and pour this on the top of the wood. You can spread this with the spatula or with your fingers (only if you are wearing gloves), so that the epoxy resin is covered everywhere over the wooden geode shape. Wipe your hands afterwards on a cloth that can be thrown away. This first layer ensures that the following layers of epoxy resin flow out better. Go over the epoxy resin with a burner to pop air bubbles.
Step 5. Add crystals/gemstones
Take a bag of about 50 grams of white gemstones/rock crystals and place them in the middle of the geode. Make sure they stay nicely together.
Step 6. Color the base
Now mix 40ml epoxy resin with, for example, white colour pigments. Pour this over and around the stones. Be careful not to drip. Does a gemstone slide away? Then place it back with a spatula. Then make another 40ml epoxy resin and mix black pigments through it. Put this in a plastic disposable cup as in the example or in a silicone mixing cup . Pour this on the outer edge.
Now you prepare 40ml epoxy resin with green color pigment for example and pour this against and around the white layer. Then another layer in a turquoise color around this again.
Step 7. Apply pattern to the epoxy
Now you can blow out the layers with a hair dryer (or heat tool ). Do this from the center outwards. This will mix the colors with each other. First set the hair dryer to a low setting. Estimate how far you want to blow out the colors. After these steps, I mixed some copper-colored pigments with epoxy resin and poured this on the outside. I then blew this out again with the hair dryer. I also blew this layer to the outside. Make sure that the epoxy resin stays on the wood and that you do not blow it all off. If that happens, your hair dryer is too high. It is possible that some drops of epoxy resin will run down the sides. You can remove this by going along the sides with your finger (do this with gloves on) or a cloth. Then go along all the epoxy resin again with a burner to pop air bubbles. Let this dry for a day and then the base is ready. If you like it you can leave it as is, but I'm going to continue with a second layer.
Step 8. Applying lines
The geode is probably already very beautiful: especially if you work with metallic pigment colors . In the light the geode already shines beautifully. But I chose to add some lines. You can do this with epoxy resin , glitter and with paint markers.
Prepare 20 ml of epoxy resin in a cup and mix a lot of glitter through it. This will give you a somewhat thicker paste. With a spatula you can take a small amount out of the cup and place it along an edge on your geode. Continue until you have made a circle. You can make as many lines and colors as you want. I have also applied blue, copper and black lines with epoxy resin . Make small amounts of epoxy resin mixed with pigment colors and make sure the lines are thin, because it will still flow out a bit. This will create differences in thickness in the geode. When you are done, go over the resin mixture again with a burner to pop the air bubbles. After this I made some extra thin lines with a white paint marker and glued a butterfly to the bottom right in the epoxy resin . There are no rules and above all follow your feeling when making the geode. Let the geode harden for another day.
Step 9. The back
Do you want to finish the geode neatly? Then a nice back is part of it. I first sanded the back, so that any leaking drops of epoxy resin are nicely removed. If you sand this, it will be very dusty, so use a face mask. Then clean it with soapy water and a mop. Dry it with a tea towel.
After this I mixed acrylic paint with a concrete look paint. There are some grains in this and this makes just like a real amethyst geode. You can also mix some sand or other grains in the paint. It gives a natural effect as if it is real stone.
I painted this mixture on the back and sides with a brush. Then let it dry well again and paint a 2nd layer on top if necessary, so that it is well covered.
Let this dry again and then you can place a hook on the back of the geode to hang it up. Or put it in a sturdy stand in a nice place in your home.
Show it!
We are of course very curious about your epoxy resin geodes! Take a selfie with your geode and post it on your socials with #creativeartbyjessica and #itsOkay Super fun to see! Who knows, do you have any questions? Feel free to ask them. Good luck!
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