How to Make a Spooky Halloween Spice Rack

Here’s another Halloween decoration to add to your dusty cobweb covered display.

Here’s what you’ll need:

A vintage wooden spice rack with jars, I keep and eye out for these year round, ones from the 1970’s are everywhere here, there are also some available on ebay, but the shipping gets pricey.

Black craft paint and brush

Matte Mod Podge

Hot glue gun

Coffee filters

Twine

If you want to make your own labels you’ll also need:

water colors, paper, coarse salt and brushes

Ink and Ink pen/quill

Halloween stamps and ink pad

Or print my labels (for personal use only) This is my first try for making a PDF to share with everyone, the sizing may be a bit off, leave a comment or email me if you have any problems with these files:




To start, dust/clean off spice rack. I bought three different ones this season and they were all covered in dust. Remove labels from jars if there are any. Some of my jars were stained from various spices, I left them dirty because it went with the look. I also chose to mix and match my spice bottles for a more eclectic look. Hobby Lobby is a good source for interesting glass jars if you would like to add in something different.

Paint the spice rack black and allow to dry.

Now lets talk about jar labels. I wanted something old and moldy looking, I also wanted the labels to be hand written. I used water colors to make the backgrounds. I brushed water over the entire page I was working on and then added black in random spots. The damp paper makes the colors leach. I also used coarse salt to get the molded effect. I also randomly splattered paint all over the finished piece. Crumpling the damp paper also gives an aged effect.

I allowed the paper to dry and then I lasered copied the originals, adjusting the contrast to get a darker finish. I cut the copies into label sized pieces and started stamping different images on to them. When I was finished stamping, using my ink and quill I hand wrote all the label names.Once the labels were dry I used Matte Mod Podge to glue them to the surface, try to only cover the glass where the label fits. The Mod Podge makes the jars appear cloudy, which is actually an interesting look.

I used the hot glue gun to affix coffee filters over the plastic lids, tearing them to size. I used new one, but you could also use tea, ink pads, or watercolors to distress the filter first. Then I applied twine around the edges to finish the look. Don’t forget to add spooky ingredients to your jars!

This spice rack is for my swap partner, so I didn’t finish decorating it. I would cover it with cobwebs and use spanish moss to fill the drawers and some of the shelves. I would also add some spiders and bugs and display this with the drawers open an full of other ghoulish stuff.

I’d love to see pictures of what you guys come up with and Happy Halloween!!!