Aged Specimen Jar Labels

By Evita Smith
Time Required: 1-2 hours

Print this Project

This is a fun way to make labels look like they’re aged for specimen jars for your spooky decor or laboratory, for Halloween or whatever occasion strikes your fancy.

What you’ll need:

Heavy card stock
Glue – glue stick/rubber cement/spray glue
Coffee – instant or leftover
Jars
Iron
Paper towels
Fonts – I got several from dafont.com

Steps

Step #1:

NextPrev

Be sure to do a test page first. Some printer inks CAN handle being printed first and then going through the 'aging' process, but most don't. I know ours doesn't.
Ball up your paper into a tight ball. I pulled it apart and balled it again. Stick it into a coffee bath. It originally called for instant coffee and water, but I used leftover coffee. We make rocket fuel and knew it would do just fine.
I played with it a bit and started to smooth it out as it began to absorb the liquid. Depending on the thickness of the paper, it can stay in anywhere from about a minute to about two minutes.

Evita Smith

3 Responses to Aged Specimen Jar Labels

Jonathan Morrison on March 18th, 2013 at 12:10 am said:

Instead of the red food colouring for the label try using a few drops of hot chocolate instead because dried blood is actually a browny rust colour
Amelia Host on September 4th, 2014 at 12:57 pm said:

Whats the font you used for the name of the item?
Lenie on September 22nd, 2015 at 5:29 pm said:

Thanks for the tutorial! This exactly what I’ve been searching for. I found these vintage doctor prescription labels at http://www.freevintagevectors.com and was looking for ways to make something custom out of them.