That Old Gray Mare Ain’t What She Used To Be: How to Revamp Your Old Toy Horses

Any horse kid has them– the cheap plastic horses they’ve acquired from birthdays and Christmas. Maybe they’re the wonky Dollar Tree ponies with bent-out legs, or Walmart toy horses long past their playing prime. You’ve gotten older– the Breyers, Stone, and others are collectible and precious, so it’s easy to keep them around. But what about these steeds? Are they even worth giving away?

Hold on. Before you reach for the donate bin or the trash bag, these horses may be salvageable yet. If they’re in good condition, they might be prime prospects for a little DIY crafting.

So today, my horse friends, I’m going to show you how to turn that boring plastic purchase into something spectacular.

What You Will Need:

• A plastic horse model (I am using an old Spirit model from a Spirit and Lucky playset)
• Primer of choice. I prefer paint-on because I like the texture, but you can also use spray-on.
• Paintbrushes
• Water
• Acrylic pain
• Sealant of choice (optional)

Step One: Prep Your Model

Wash the model so it’s entirely free of debris (you may need to use an old toothbrush to reach hard spots). When it’s completely dry, cover the model in the primer. You may need to do two coats. If using a paint-on, try to make all the strokes go in the same direction as the hair on a real horse would.

Let completely dry before moving on.

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Step Two: Decide Your Colors and Patterns

Find a reference photo of the color you’re going to paint. If you have specific patterns or designs in mind, use a pencil to mark the areas. Here, I used a reference photo of a stallion in my color choice– chestnut snowflake Appaloosa (credit to Pinterest).

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Step Three: Base Paint

Then, start mixing your colors! Since this isn’t a how to paint tutorial, I won’t go into all the specifics of how to mix paint colors, but if you want to know how I learned, check out DeeJayBe and her Youtube videos. She customizes Breyers for living and her website is chock-full of resources on shading, sculpting, painting, and more! (Link at the bottom of the article).

Since I’m painting a chestnut, I mixed orange, blue, and red to create a nice rusty chestnut color. I leave the mane and the tail blank for the next step. At a minimum, let the paint mostly dry. Slightly damp paint makes it easier to blend colors into the coat if you make a mistake.

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Step Four: Paint the Points

The points are the mane, tail, and legs. I wait until the base coat is dry to paint these because often they are a harsh contrast to the color itself, and colors like black and white are hard to blend into the base. In this case, however, I only painted them with a darker red. Do not paint any legs that you wish to have stocking or socks.

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Step Five: Shading

Using very small amounts of paint, begin to blend in lighter and darker shades. The amount will depend on the color. In this, I used yellow to lighten the chestnut tones. This part takes the longest, but the end result, with patience, is always satisfying. Here, I shaded in the horse first, then started adding the white spots.

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Step Five: Finishing Touches

Finally, finish off your model! Here, I whitened the socks, colored in the hooves (and added stripes, as appropriate for the breed), adding a little more “frosting” to the mane and tail, and colored in the eyes (for an excellent article on painting model horse eyes, check it out THIS post from Breyer). Once all the paint is dry, add sealant, if you so choose.

And then you’re done! You’ve officially transformed your toy horse into a piece of art.

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Here’s a final slideshow of all the stages from start to finish:

What are some of your favorite ways to repurpose toy horses? If you customize model horses, do you have any preferred methods for your process?

RESOURCES:

MODEL HORSES – THE ART OF DARYNN BEDNARCZYK

THE ART OF DARYNN BEDNARCZYK – MODEL HORSE TUTORIALS

Repairing Damaged Eyes — BreyerHorses.com