Custom White Board

What And Why?

Since moving into our house years ago, Mrs Evilution has wanted a small white board that  she could write down jobs for me to ignore during the day instead of surf the internet.

We bought a few but none of them did the job. They were usually badly made,  the pen didn’t wipe off, the fixings were poor and they looked boring as hell.

What she wanted was a small board to go on the fridge door and a magnetic pen.

What Do I Need?

This is assuming you have basic essentials like a printer and a laminater. If you don’t have  a printer you can make a collage of pictures on the A4 sheet. If you don’t have a laminater,  you can get cold lamination pouches so you don’t even need the hot lamination machine.

You will need a special whiteboard pen although I found any non permanent felt tip  pen will work although it will not ‘dry wipe’ off, you will need to use a wet tissue. You will also need some magnets to hold it and the pen to the fridge.

Make Your Own Whiteboard

Get a nice picture. To keep this silly idea on track, I decided on a picture of my car. I also printed the word MEMO at the top so it’s obvious what it is.

Here is the final printout from my budget HP Color LaserJet 1600 (good quality for £99). Next to it is the A4 hot lamination pouch I have chosen to use. It is all sitting on  top of my (frankly overkill for this project) A2 hot laminater that will seal it all up.

With it run through the laminater and the printed A4 sheet sealed, we are ready to go.

With a magnet in each corner it was stuck to the fridge and left myself a note so I don’t forget.

I took the pen and used impact adhesive to glue a small magnet to the lid.

Job done, now Kat can write a list of housework so she doesn’t forget to do it all at the weekend.

Added Tips For This Project

Don’t be too concerned about the ‘micron’ grading of the lamination pouches, there isn’t a  great deal in it between 80 and 250. It is really designed to protect what has been laminated,  as we aren’t using it for that purpose it doesn’t really matter. Low micron is cheaper though.

If you feel your new white board is too flimsy, you can try using thicker paper. Check  the handbook for your printer, laser printers usually handle thicker paper than inkjets.

In this version I actually used a second piece of paper behind the printed one to add thickness. This made the finished white board a lot more rigid than the initial test one I made.

I Don’t Have A Neat Printer Like Yours

Shame, you should consider one, only £99. If you can’t afford it, get creative. Cut out pictures from a magazine or get your favourite photos colour photocopied at a print store and cut them out. You can build up a single picture using several pictures, this is called a collage.

If you aren’t printing and making a collage instead, you can use card instead of paper.

Be creative, you don’t have to have a picture of your car on it. If you are really sad you  could have a picture of your partner, kids, grandkids or favourite porn star like Ron Jeremy.

Don’t limit yourself with pictures, you can laminte confetti and glitter into your whiteboard.

The important thing to remember is what ever you laminate has to be flat and don’t forget to leave space for writing. Even though you have the space, you don’t have to use it all. Subtle works best.

Did You Make A Whiteboard?

If you follow these instructions and come up with something that looks good, send me a picture and then take a good long think about how sad your life is that you have made such a thing.