In the spirit of Baby Rose’s Catan themed nursery, we created this fabulous DIY Settlers of Catan string art this weekend.
It’s been so long since I’ve crafted, I almost forgot how good it is for the soul. My hands (and part of my leg) may be splotched blue, but my heart is content.
And hey, this thing took so long to make, I decided its going to college with Baby Rose. It’ll look great in a dorm room.
I’m pretty thrilled with how it turned out. The string colors give it a nice vintage feel, but the hex shapes keep it looking modern. Each hex string color represents one of the traditional resources (sheep, wood, brick, wheat and rock).
The board itself is modeled after the Seafarers version of Catan.
Look, you don’t create a Settlers of Catan themed nursery owning just one version of the game. We contemplated a traditional Settlers of Catan themed board, but ultimately went Seafarers as the Seafarer play board is bigger and has a rectangle shape vs. square, thus fit our wall better.
This craft was especially fun because the boy was totally into it.
Now, I wouldnt say he has the best crafting endurance or frustration tolerance, but he helped from start to finish which was super sweet and makes this piece that much more special for the nursery.
Crafting reminds me of hanging out with my granny when I was little. She’d let me sit at her wooden kitchen table with a pile of left over scraps: lace, old buttons of all sizes, unwanted shapes and colors of felt. I’d sit there for hours and create “collages”. How I loved just gluing junk to paper. The simple things really are the best.
Before, this craft I’d never done string art before, but I’d recommend it. It’s easy, cheap and versatile. Pinterest has a lot of great ideas, but you can create any shape you can hammer with nails. And the end product looks great, even if you’re like me and far from a perfectionist.
We lucked out because pretty much everything we needed for this DIY Settlers of Catan string board, from the string to the wooden pallets, was on sale at hobby lobby bringing out total cost to approximately $65. That includes the pallets, stain, yarn and wood. $45 of that was the pallets, so if you find cheaper wood, this craft could be super cheap.
Should anyone be so inclined to create your own DIY Settlers of Catan string board, here is the step by step guide on how we created ours. I’ll give the dimensions and colors we used, however, these can all be customized to fit your needs. You can also easily add a desert hex if you’re into that sort of thing. I personally hate the desert hex, so we left it off.
DIY Settlers of Catan String Board:
Total time needed approximately 6-8 hours.
(Final dimensions on the wall are 33 1/2 tall by 63 inches wide, this includes a 3 inch gap in between each of the 3 pallets)
- Supplies needed:
- 5 spools of string for hexes (burnt orange for brick, light green for sheep, dark green for wood, grey for rock, mustard yellow for wheat)
- 3 raw wood pallets measuring 18 1/2 inch wide by 33 1/2 inch tall
- Blue stain (we used “island blue” from Sherwin Williams)
- Nails (the tall skinny ones)
- Hammer
- Chalk pencil for drawing design out
- 1 hex template, 3 1/2 inches on all sides. Cut it out so it can be traced. You can print this from the power point on your computer.
Instructions:
- Stain all pallets blue. One coat of stain looked fine, but two coats looked awesome, so I recommend doing two from the get go.
- After stain has dried, draw out the hexes, using your printed and cut out hex. We went with a Seafarers pattern, however you can draw your hexes out in any pattern of board you like. Just measure out 3 1/2 inches per hex in both length and width to create your preferred board design.
- Hammer nails into all the corners of your hexes. This can be a bit loud, Bourbon hid in his crate while this was going on.
- String time! Starting with one corner nail, tie off the string, then loop the sting to each nail corresponding with that hex. When your done with one nail, move the next nail (staying in the same hex), until each nail has been looped with string to all the other nails. This can take a second, the Pandora Pit Bull station is recommended 🙂
- We varied our hex colors in no particular pattern but tried to spread them out the way a real Catan board would be.
- Viola, after all the hexes are strung, you’re done!
A few other great ideas:
- I think a felt robber may be fun to add, or perhaps roads, houses and/or ships. You could also probably add in the hex numbers with a little creativity as well.
Happy Crafting!
Dina says
I love this! ❤
thegingerlifeblog@gmail.com says
Thanks Dina!!