Coconut Shell Craft: How To Make Fairy Toadstools

In this simple coconut shell craft we make gorgeous fairy toadstools for our garden using non-toxic paint to keep them environmentally friendly.

We love adding quirky pieces of recycled sculpture and art to our garden. They add a pop of colour and give interest to the garden all year round. I do feel it’s essential, however, to try and avoid adding anything toxic to our natural environment.

Our fairy toadstools are made from 100% natural materials, and will all naturally break down over time so are perfect to be used in the garden or even placed in the woods or a park as Wild Art.

What we used to make our coconut shell craft fairy toadstools.

Coconut shells
Wood pieces from a fallen branch
Milk paint

Where can I buy coconut shells for craft?

If you don’t want to prepare coconut shells from scratch, you can find coconut shells for crafts on eBay and in craft shops.

What is milk paint?

Old Fashioned Milk Paint ( Amazon Affiliate link) is a water-based paint made from milk protein, lime and clay with natural pigments added for colour. Milk paint contains only natural ingredients, so it is environmentally safe and non-toxic, making it perfect to use on these garden fairy toadstools.

Milk paint has been in use for thousands of years. It sinks into porous materials and hardens over time, giving a beautiful finish as shown in our How to turn strawberry planters into succulent pots tutorial.

How to make fairy toadstools out of coconut shells.

Milk paint comes in a powder form, so start by mixing up the colours. The supplier I used sells sample packs of just 30g, which is perfect for little projects like these. I used less than half the sample pack to give four coconut shells, two coats of colour.

Out of the two red tones of milk paint that I bought, I couldn’t decide which one I liked best, so I started by painting 2 shells each red, before covering them all with a second coat of the lighter red.

I then left the shells to dry overnight, before decorating them with white spots.

For the stems, I found a fallen branch about an inch in diameter and cut four lengths to make the stem of the toadstool.

And painted the bark with a single thin coat of the white milk paint to brighten it.

The coconut shell toadstool caps sit happily on their wood stems, so I decided not to secure mine, but you could easily use a nail or some glue to do so if you wish.

Finally, my daughter and I took our fairy toadstools to our local woods to check out how they looked in their natural setting.

And we think the photos speak for themselves.

Our coconut shell fairy toadstools look perfect sprouting from the moss.

And I think they make a perfect bit of wild art for others to find.

If you’ve enjoyed our coconut shell fairy toadstool tutorial why not check out some of our other quirky garden craft projects. You’ll find a selection of our favourites below.