Travel Shadow box - DIY Wall Decor

…Display your Adventures…

This is something I have been wanting to do forever. We have this ziploc bag loaded with bunch of travel tickets from our various adventures locked away in a storage tote. Either a new ziploc is added for the new trip tickets or just thrown inside the box thinking to sort them later. The only time we see it is when we are moving to a new home. So, I thought it will be nice to display them on wall. Also, a shadow box will allow you to add new tickets. Cool right! 🙂

If you are interested to hear our travel stories, click here

We were visiting AC Moore during its close out sale and saw this cork shadow box on sale. This travel box project immediately popped into my mind and so I grabbed it for 7$. Converting it into a travel themed shadow box is pretty simple. Just need to remove the existing wine cork themed lettering, apply new quote or phrase, increase the size of the slot on top to add new tickets, change the back panel design and change the frame color if required. The total project cost was less than 10$.

Materials Used:

Any Shadow Box
Blade or any sharp metal scrapper
Soap water
Design sheet (travel themed backing)
Tools – Drill & Jig saw or Hand saw
Vinyl paper or any design paper
Knife blade
Quick hold Glue

Travel shadow box – A perfect wall decor for Adventurers

Step – 1:

Remove the back panel. I used my knife to bend the metal projection on all side to remove the back panel.

travel shadow box - the nomad studio DIY

Step – 2:

Then I tried to find if the letters on the glass are sticker or paint. If its sticker you can easily peel off. But it was paint. So, only way is to scrap off each letter one by one. First apply the soap water on the paint and let it soak in. Then, I tried to scrub it with steel wool. But it did not work. Then I tried with this pointy tool. I am not sure what its called but it came with the mini sewing kit that I had. Anyways, it took a little time but it did the job. I was afraid that glass might end up with scratches. Luckily, it was fine.

Step – 3:

If you have a cricut or any vinyl cutting machine, then this step is very easy. But I do not have one. Yet!. So I hand drew the texts on a thick glitter paper and cut with a knife blade. I used scissors to smoothed the blade cut straight edges on the letters for clean look. Its not perfect as a machine cut but I like doing it.:) someday I might replace it with machine cut vinyl text.

Step – 4:

Time to cut an opening to drop the tickets inside. Since this shadow box was meant for corks, it had a hole at center. As it will not be enough, I widened the opening a little with a driller and jigsaw.

I did this cutting after the step – 5(gluing the letters), which is a big mistake. Its pretty hard to get rid of the saw dust. The letters began to fall as I tried to clean them.

Step – 5:

Arrange the letters on the glass and see if you like the spacing and size. Once you are confident, glue one by one. I used this quick hold glue and a tweezer to fix mine.

Step – 6:

Next, lets fix the back panel and then its good to go!. I wanted a colorful world map of some sort as a background. But, my local store only had a American theme paper in the size I need. Its OK. I can replace the backing design later whenever I find the world map in right size and color. So I went ahead and bought the design paper and fixed it to the back panel.