I had a wee little bud vase that a friend gave to me many years ago that fell off a shelf. Our mischievous cat knocked it over in the middle of the night and I was so sad when I found it broken.
The vase was special to me so instead of tossing it I thought I’d give the traditional art of kintsugi a try. Kintsugi is the Japanese method of repairing broken or cracked ceramics with gold dust mixed with lacquer or epoxy. It’s the practice of emphasizing scars instead of hiding them. I thought I’d give it a try to repair my little broken bud vase and now it’s perfectly imperfect in its repaired state.
Traditional kintsugi uses real gold in powder form but in my case I did a faux version using golden pigment powder and epoxy glue mixed together. You can buy DIY kits online using the same combination (see this kit and this kit). I simply bought a little container of gold pigment dust from Michaels and an epoxy glue as well, then mixed them together to create a golden glue to reattach the broken pieces together.
The supplies you need to do the same are pictured below: gold pigment powder, epoxy glue, small plastic container for mixing, small tip paintbrushes, mixing stick, and latex gloves.
The process is not complicated, it just takes a little patience. I painted on the golden epoxy with a little paintbrush and attached to no more than three pieces at a time so they could dry in larger segments which required that I mix the gold pigment dust and the epoxy in small amounts four separate times. I waited a full hour between sessions for the epoxy to fully bond before moving on to attaching additional segments together.
I’m posting a Reel on Instagram so you can see the process in a video since I didn’t take any in progress photos. I’m so happy with how it turned out, in fact I like the bud vase even more now. :)
Kintsugi is proof that broken things can be made more beautiful with a little love and attention. :)
I love this so much!! I had a large broken in 3 big pieces marble platter and I had heard of this repair. Googling instructions made it look way too daunting. So, I glued it up with epoxy and painted the cracks with a gold paint pen. It’s ok, but this would be so much better. Now I can’t wait for something to break??!!
It came out beautiful! I would have never guessed that it had been broken.
Would this work for a broken mug… would the mug be safe to use after the repair? I like what you did for the vase. The end result is very pretty.
Thank you so much, I cannot guarantee that this DIY version is food safe! You could of course repair the mug and use it to store pens or small items, but personally I wouldn’t heat a mug with an epoxy filled crack and drink from it.
The gold and white kintsugi looks really nice with the blue and white! Trying Japanese kintsugi has been on my bucket list, but nothing good enough to repair has broken yet, hah! But I did get an urushi Japanese lacquer DIY kit I’m excited to try out in the meantime.
As soon as I saw that vase, I instantly thought I love it. After reading how it came to be, I guess I need to find something to break! :) When I read “Kintsugi is proof that broken things can be made more beautiful with a little love and attention.”, it reminded me that this is true of people too. A beautiful reminder as I celebrate Holy Week.