While we all appreciate showcasing the natural beauty of wood and grain, painting your spoons, bowls, cups, and treen with Old Fashioned Milk Paint offers a food-safe way to add a creative touch to your wooden crafts. We've long admired painted wooden items, particularly as seen in the Scandinavian sløyd/slöjd tradition, which we first encountered in the loppis of Sweden.

Old Fashioned Milk Paint comes in powder form, ready to be mixed with water to create small or large batches as needed. Available in 32 historic base colours - often found in Early American and Colonial woodenware, (with some Scandinavian connections/ influences!) - you can mix these powders to create custom shades or lighten any colour with Snow White. We stock all 32 colours at Woodsmith in two convenient sizes: a 60g Sample Pack and a 1 Pint Bag.

The 60g Sample Bag is perfect for most spoon carvers, providing enough paint to cover dozens of spoons. It's an ideal way to experiment with different colours before committing to a larger quantity.

Made from natural ingredients like milk protein (casein), lime, and earth pigments, Old Fashioned Milk Paint is completely non-toxic, baby-safe, food-safe, and biodegradable.

Available Sizes:

• Sample/Tester Bag (60g): Covers about one square meter—great for smaller projects and testing colour combinations.
• Pint Bag (170g/6oz): Makes 1 American pint (16 fl oz or 0.47 litres) when mixed with water. Covers approximately 35 square feet (3.25 square meters), usually enough for two coats on a large chest of drawers. Or many, many bowls and spoons!

About Old Fashioned Milk Paint:

Old Fashioned Milk Paint is the first commercially produced milk paint, a faithful re-creation of the ancient homemade formula used for centuries before modern paints. Beloved by woodworkers, furniture restorers, interior designers, artisans, and up-cyclers, it provides an authentic period finish ideal for restoring or reproducing antiques and other wood projects. Its flat finish delivers a vintage color that’s exceptionally durable on porous surfaces, resisting fading over time. It’s also perfect for aging techniques like distressing, chipping, and crackling. For added protection, it can be sealed with flat varnish, wax, or oil.