Painted Diamond Dock

Painted Diamond Dock How To

I love a painted pattern, like my painted diamond dock! Today I’m sharing all the EASY steps with you! We are lucky to have found lakefront property in the town Mark and I grew up in. We built our dream home on the land and added a dock for our boat to tie to and for the kids to jump off of!

Now, a dock is just a dock like any other ol’ dock until you give it some CHARACTER. {Which is what I love to do best!} Taking an ordinary space and making it special by adding some charm is what Thorn Cove Abode is all about! 😝

A Charming Dock

When it comes to a dock, I do feel you are a bit limited on what you can do, but I didn’t let that stop me. I knew I wanted to add something to it to take our boring dock to another level, but it had to be something that would withstand all the elements. While outdoor pillows, rugs and decor can add coziness, they aren’t very practical on the dock to withstand the wind and rain. That’s when I decided to stain a fun pattern on the wood! I chose to go with a harlequin pattern. A couple years ago, I painted this same pattern on my porches {read more about that here}, so I thought keeping this pattern would tie everything on our property together.

How I Started

About four years ago, when I first used the harlequin pattern on my porch, I discovered a trick to make this all come together. I knew I wanted to paint the porch, but also knew I didn’t want the headache of figuring out any math or using any lasers and/or lines. While I could have enlisted the help of my husband, I know he loathes these kinds of jobs. I decided to just figure out a way to do it myself. He would have helped me, but then I would have had to wait on him and I’m too impatient for that. 🤣 

I started by searching my decor closets for the right shape. And guess what? I found a perfectly square old clock face. The face is 14 ¾ on all sides and was the perfect sized square for my space! {I knew having all those decor closets would pay off!}

The Perfect Diamond

To begin the shape, I always find my center point and work out from there. I don’t have any technical reasons why this works, but this process always ends well for me. 🤣 I do try to make sure the lines looks straight (I usually just eyeball the first one) and then start working my way off the center square.

In order to ensure I stay level and my squares don’t get wonky, I pull out my tape measure to create a straight line from the ending tip of the template I traced to the starting tip of my next diamond, which should be the measurement of my template at 14 ¾. Thankfully, since it’s outside and most human eyes can’t detect a perfect line, it’s ok if it’s not entirely perfect.  

Painted Diamond Tips

Typically, I work on two rows at at time. Be prepared, you most likely won’t finish this in a day unless you have a small space, like a laundry room. I recommend doing it in bite sized pieces so you don’t get frustrated {ask me how i know this can happen 😜} It takes me about an hour to trace, tape and paint two rows.

For this painted diamond dock project, I use cheap paint brushes as the gel stain you need just ruins brushes. I use this cheap pack of brushes and throw them away when I’m done for the day. For the dock project, I went with a gel stain. A normal stain would run underneath the tape and you wouldn’t get that clean and crisp line needed.

I used Minwax Multi SurfaceGel Stain in the color “coffee”. The color turned out a bit darker than I thought, but I don’t mind it in the end. Truthfully, I’m sure the sun will fade the color even with the clear coat on top {that I still need to do!} 🤪

The Final Product

You really do need to seal the dock when you are done! I have a five gallon bucket of sealer I bought on sale awhile ago. Hopefully it works haha! I’ve heard wonderful things about Thompson’s Water Sealant. If I hadn’t already purchased the sale sealer, that’s what I would recommend to protect your diamond dock!

We usually do a light power wash on our dock one time a year right before the summer season. I didn’t seal the dock the first time I did the diamond pattern. So, I’m not sure how long the sealant will last before it needs to be sealed again. I’ll guessing I’ll need to reseal yearly to maintain. 

P.S. Don’t you love the addition of the slide we added this year?? The kids are in heaven!