DIY Dartboard

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DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

This is it, guys! The grand finale to our game night series! Mr. Lovely has been bugging me forever about getting a dartboard. And obviously I have been holding off because, ya know, I don’t live in a college frat house. But I got to thinking that maybe if I could make a dartboard that looked a little less… ugly, I could get into the idea. I thought and thought about the best way to make a dartboard, and came to the conclusion that it would probably be best to just get one and customize it. So follow all the links below for the materials I used, along with a freebie download for the dartboard numbers!

Materials

Make Time: 3 Hours

First, take your dartboard and remove the metal ring with numbers around the outside. You should be able to pry it off with pliers.

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

If the board has any branding on the black portion, paint over it with black paint to make a clean background.

DIY Dartboard

Choose two colors you love to replace the green and red (those colors are my main complaints about a darboard! Ugh.). Use one color to paint over all the green, and another color to paint over all the red. Try to stay tidy! You might need two coats.

DIY Dartboard

Now! Here’s the number template. If you are super patient and really amazing, print it onto an 8.5 x 11″ piece of contact paper and cut out the numbers with a craft knife. I am totally not that patient any more, so all of these delicate cutting jobs get sent through my Cricut machine! Seriously, you can just take the template, open it with the Cricut software, insert some contact paper, and all of those little numbers will be cut in about a minute flat. It’s a beautiful thing.

Starting with the 20 at the top center of the board, stick the contact paper to the dartboard to stencil on the numbers. Smooth thoroughly  to be sure no paint seeps through, and stencil each number carefully. Remove the contact paper while the numbers are still slightly wet for the best results. Be sure to use the metal number ring as a guide to remember the order of the numbers on the board.

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

While the board is drying, fancy up your darts. Cover the metal tip with painter’s tape. In a well-ventilated area, cover the plastic portion with spray adhesive. Sprinkle with glitter and tap off the excess. Cover with one or two coats of glitter sealant. Allow everything to dry thoroughly.

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

Yes! A dartboard that doesn’t look like it belongs in a beer-soaked pub. We’ve been having a ton of fun with this in the house, even though I admit we’ve had to spackle a few holes in the wall (I’d recommend a backboard to protect from people with poor aim!). And I’m pretty sure I’m leading Mr. Lovely on the ol’ scoreboard. Have fun! xoxo

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

DIY Dartboard

DIY DartboardTutorial photos by Lovely Indeed; all other photos by Whitney B. Lucas.

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44 Comments

  1. How cool – way to spice up something old and worn out! It looks so chick now and for next to pennies!!

  2. Just found your blog, and I am smitten! It’s adorable. I am so excited to follow along! Oh, and I would hang that sparkly dartboard in my house any day.

    1. The reason for not painting in the numbers and for the wired numbers is for rotating the board when the numbers frequently thrown start getting worn. You can then rotate the board and then move the ring to position the numbers. This give cricket players fresh pies or wedges. Your board looks great though. The wired numbers just helps to preserve the board. You know when the board needs replacing when the bull gets so worn that darts don’t stick. Even rotating the board moves dead spots on the bull.

      1. a bit of work, but I imagine the board could just be rotated and repainted. Going to go out on a limb and guess that it’s going to be quite a while until this board gets that much wear, though.

  3. Love those sparkly darts! I wouldn’t have even thought about sprucing up the darts too! This is such a great project!
    xoxo,
    Jessica

    1. Haha! I love the darts — my husband isn’t so sure if they’re manly enough. 😉 I say real men aren’t afraid of a little glitter.

  4. Wow, I never thought a dart board could look so fabulous! This definitely inspires me to break out my old dart board, fix it up, and actually use it. Thanks for sharing!

  5. Okay, this is amazing. We have a dart board but it’s removable from the wall because I am embarrassed of it. 😛 I so need to do this!!!

  6. Any thoughts on how to protect the wall behind it while still looking cute? I don’t have great aim. 🙂

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  8. YES! Glittered some darts ages ago and at the time tried to figure out how to make my own dartboard and gave up didn’t even think of modifying one!

    1. Awesome Mandy! That was a hesitation of mine too, until I realized I could just customize an existing one and it would be just as cool.

  9. At our house we absolutely LOVE darts! (we used to be in a dart league). you did a fantastic job on this project. What we do is get a large framed corkboard for the dartboard to set in the middle of. This way missed darts go in corkboard, not wall. and, of course, we all know how to “pretty up” a corkboard!!! Have Fun!!

  10. And I also found “dry erase” whiteboard contact paper that I have “prettied up” and use as a scoreboard!

  11. That is terrible. No self respecting man would allow his ol’lady to destroy a nice board like that.

    1. Yeah this has nothing to do with Darts. The Numbers painted on will wear off. The two colors of Double and Triple are too close together. And the Darts itself are Carnival quality.

      This is nothing but some hipsters trying to look cool…

    2. THANK YOU! This made my skin crawl. I’m always trying to get more women to come throw darts in our league… but if this is what it takes? I’m all set- you ladies can stay home and play with your glittery junk.

      1. No worries gang! To each his own. I’m sure if I played competitively it would bug me too. But I don’t. And just FYI, the numbers haven’t worn off yet. 🙂

        1. I like the way the numbers look. one thing to consider if you’re going to be playing a lot of darts is that the purpose of the red and green is to help with aiming, so changing the colors will actually make it a bit tougher.

  12. Do you have any idea how a person could would go about turning a plain set of quality dart flights into diy custom flights? I’ve been going in circles online first, going I could just order them, but everything I find is in the U.K. so I thought maybe I could do it myself, but once again, circles! I cannot find directions for this

  13. Hi

    Love the Dart board in new colors. Can you please advise what was your board made of and what type of paint did you use?

  14. Hello has anyone done this? I need to paint a dart board but don’t want it to make the board solid when he paint dries. What kind of paint did you use and did the darts still go in the board? Thank you.

    1. Hi Anthony! I used standard acrylic craft paint, and yes, the darts still permeate the surface and stick in the board. Hope you try it out!

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  16. Nice collection of information on indoor & arcade games. I have also come across one other gaming blog that’s free to play simple online games. They have 1000+ games to play. Do check them out – GameroomGuys.com

  17. If you think a dart board is ugly, then don’t put one up… If your significant other plays darts and you wont let them put up a board, then they should just go to the pub and hang with the cool kids who throw darts!

  18. Oh this is terrible. As mentioned above, the wired numbers are for rotating the board and extending its lifespan. It doesn’t look like this board is destined for anything but decoration and your husband limp-wristing some sparkly darts once a year, so that probably doesn’t matter–but damn…

  19. If you plan on using the dartboard a decent amount, keep the movable number ring on it. The board will wear on the most used numbers. You can rotate the board a few sections, then move the number ring to match where the numbers should be to keep the wear down.

  20. This has really inspired me – I play darts and have the same issue, I didn’t really want the dartboard on permanent display or holes all over the walls! I bought a portable stand but it’s a hassle to put up and down, gets left up and in the way. I shall have a go at doing something similar – thank you.

  21. Love this! I’ve been trying r
    to figure out a custom dart board for a good friend’s house warming, and this is a perfect way to make it! Thanks for posting this!