DIY Personalised Coffee Cups

You may be forgiven that thinking that our guest bedroom is close to completion, I mean we only started the makeover about 1.5 years ago, but it’s been about 85% done for months now.

The allure of a shiny new project is just too hard to resist and I admit that we tend to get distracted. Often. The dark and cold winter months probably don’t help either as I always feel more like hibernating than renovating!

Now that spring is just around the corner, we’re feeling invigorated to get stuck in again and one of the jobs that is high up on our to-do list is finally finishing our guest bedroom makeover! Not least because we can then finally start to welcome Airbnb guests!

Whilst we still have a few bigger issues like the curtains, a rug and better lighting to sort, we are already thinking about the finishing touches that will hopefully make this room feel extra special. We have Berlin-themed eye masks, a selection of guidebooks and magazines as well as a few other bits that we’ll be keeping secret for our guests to discover when they stay with us.

Another Berlin-themed addition are our new DIY personalised coffee cups.

Aren’t they fun?

I just couldn’t resist “berlinifying” these cups with a Berlin underground theme but you could obviously choose any image you’d like.

Like most projects we share around here, these were really easy and cheap to make.

If you fancy making your own DIY personalised coffee cups, this is what you will need:

Cups, mugs and/or saucers (we used these ones from Ikea)
Decal paper (this is the paper that we used)
Image to print & a printer (this is the one we used)
Varnish
Methylated spirits

This is how to make the DIY personalised coffee cups:

1. Clean.

Start by thoroughly cleaning your cups and saucers. You have to make sure that they’re completely clean and grease free otherwise the decal won’t stick as well. We gave ours a wash and then wiped the area where we wanted to apply the decal with some white spirit to make sure it was super clean.

2. Print.

Print the image you want to decorate your cups and saucers with on to some decal paper. We used this decal paper and just printed on to it with our inkjet printer. I drew the image of the little underground carriages and then scanned it so that I could print it onto the decal paper (You can download the image we used here). You can obviously use any image you’d like though!

3. Transfer.

Follow the instructions of the decal paper that you’re using to transfer your image to the cups and saucers.

It’s really easy to use and you basically just wet the paper, wait a couple of minutes and then slide the image over on to your plate or cup. You can then still adjust the position slightly before dabbing it dry with a cloth and making sure there are no air bubbles in it.

4. Seal.

When your image has completely dried, it’s a good idea to seal it to make it more durable and food safe. I have to admit, that I struggled to find a varnish that was food safe and in the end, used this one.

5. Enjoy!

All that’s left to do is enjoy your personalised DIY printed cups and saucers.

As the decal paper and the varnish both aren’t food safe., we purposely glued the decals images to areas where they won’t be in contact with the person drinking out of the cup.

Now, all we need is to finish the room and some guests to enjoy our guest bedroom – and Berlin, of course!

How do you like to make your guests feel welcome? What would you like to find in a guest bedroom?