Mermaid Shells

By Amy Bentley

I had never connected my love of crafting and seashells until I recently began making mosaics with shells I’d found at beaches in Florida, where I live. The one thing I never thought I’d do, however, is paint any of my shells. Painting a shell that’s already beautiful in its natural state just felt wrong, I guess.

That was until I saw a Mermaid Shell for sale online one day while surfing the web. It was a medium-sized whelk painted a frosty silver/blue and decorated with small artificial pearls and gems. I was smitten by this whimsical piece and thought to myself, that I could probably make one just like it. And so I did.

I already had just the right shell, a similar-sized whelk in great condition that I’d bought at a roadside souvenir stand on Sanibel Island last year. I went to my local craft store and bought supplies to make my own mermaid shell.

Supplies

• Clean seashell
• Metallic craft paint in complementary colors
• Small plastic gems, pearls, rhinestones, and jewels in various colors
• E6000 clear craft glue

Paint the Shell

To paint the shell, I poured some of each color paint on a paper plate. I painted the shell mostly blue first, then blended the aqua and purple paints together on the plate and painted them on the shell also, blending in the colors so some of the aqua and purple shows over the blue. I added some extra streaks of aqua and purple paint down the length of the shell. On other shells I used shades of pink and shades of green.

When the top and sides of the shell were completely dry, I turned it over and painted the bottom.

Decorate the Shell

Think about how you want your shell to look BEFORE you glue anything on it. Play with patterns and ideas, placing your gems and pearls over the shell loosely to see how they will look before gluing.

When gluing on the gems, make sure to position the shell so it’s facing upward until the glue dries. You can lean the shell on anything from books to a folded towel, or stand it upright in a measuring cup. The area where you glue a gem on the shell needs to be flat and facing upward so the gem won’t slide over while the glue is still wet.

E6000 is a strong glue so if you make a mistake and need to pull off a gem once the glue is dry, this could take some paint off with it or leave a messy mark of dried glue. More glue will come out of the tube than you need for the really small rhinestones and gems. I used a toothpick to extract only a small bit of glue from the tube for each gem. E6000 dries fast so I gently removed any extra glue around the gems before the glue dried.

Once finished, find a premiere spot in your house to display your Mermaid Shell.

This one-of-a-kind piece of art will remind you of the sea.

Make art with your beach finds

Learn how to make art, jewelry, and fun home decorations with seashells, sea glass, beach rocks, and more. Articles ›

This article appeared in Beachcombing Magazine Volume 39 November/December 2023.