Did you know you can use just salt and vinegar to age brass? So cool! We’ve used the New York Knob from Nostalgic Warehouse in our home before and decided we wanted them all over our house. We had 4 different kinds of knobs in our home and were ready for everything to match and flow. These New York Knobs are beautiful and have a sort of vintage feel to them. While these knobs fit the style of our home perfectly, I wanted to tone down the brass so they look aged and like they’ve been in the house for years. I decided to make my own DIY aged brass door knobs! Here’s how I did it.
Materials
I started by filling my large plastic bin with about an inch of distilled white vinegar. Then, I used almost an entire container of table salt.
I put all the knobs on another smaller plastic bin inside the large one so they weren’t actually touching the mixture.
Then, I let them sit in the bin to oxidize. Here’s what they looked like after just 2 hours.
And here’s what they looked like after 6 hours! It’s crazy that all of this happens because of the fumes. Science rules🤓
I went back the next day and repeated the same process for all of my plates and screws so they’d match.
The brand new unlacquered brass worked perfectly. But, the ones we already had around our house for a a year or so turned green. I’m not sure if it was because they’d already started to patina a bit or the fumes had worn off after 7 hours. But, I started over with these. I re-polished them with Barkeepers Friend and repeated the whole process – and it worked! Look at this before and after!
These truly are my dream door knobs! I’m so happy with how they turned out. Now I can’t decide…should these DIY aged brass door knobs go on my navy doors or my white ones? They both look so good!
Thank you so much to Nostalgic Warehouse for helping me complete this project. I hope this gives you the confidence to make your own DIY aged brass door knobs – it’s so easy!
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