Make a Donut Stand & Sign for a DIY Donut Bar

How to create donut stacking stands and a colorful donut sign for a DIY donut bar.

In the last post, Add a DIY Donut Bar to Your Next Party, I explained all the essentials you need for a DIY donut bar. Of course the sky is the limit for the embellishments and extras you can add to make your donut bar extra special, it could look like you just walked into a donut shop. Well that is not my style, nor is it in my budget, not that it wouldn’t be amazing. Any how I did do two things to make the donut bar for my mom’s birthday special, I added a donut sign and made my own donut stands. The supply lists for the projects are really inexpensive, it just takes a little time to make them.

the donut sign

Supplies

plain flat cardboard (no markings or print at least on front side)
scissors &/or x-acto knife
yard stick or ruler
straight edge to cut with
tissue paper in color(s) of your choice
mod podge
foam brush
1 x 2″ wood board in desired length *optional
fishing line *optional

How To

Decide on the overall height and width of the sign you want. Measure out and draw a box for each letter on the cardboard, so each letter comes out close to the same size. Using the box, draw each letter inside with your straight edge and free handing any curves.
Depending on the thickness of your cardboard you can either cut each letter with scissors or you may need to use an x-acto knife and straight edge.
Cut your tissue paper into small squares. I made mine about 2″ but you can base them on the size of your letters, making sure they cover the width. Cutting these does not have to be perfect, no need to measure, eyeballing them is fine. The quickest way I found was to cut each sheet into 2″ strips and then stack them up to cut into squares.
Working in small sections, brush on the mod podge and apply tissue paper pieces, overlapping each other. Do one layer at time and let dry before applying next layer. You can apply as many layers as you like, the more layers the stronger the color and the less transparent it becomes. End with a layer of mod podge on the top, to seal.
Once the letters have dried completely, using scissors cut along the edge to remove the access, overhanging tissue paper.
This is the trickiest part and is going to depend on where are putting it and what you are putting it on. How I did mine was use a 1 x 2″ board and stapled the letters to it, then hung the board with fishing line from an awning. Now you may not have something to hang it from like an awing or beam, you may just have a blank wall. It all depends of the surface of the wall, but double sided removable sticky wall tabs may work or if you don’t mind holes you could tack them up. Hanging a sign always provides a little challenge, so I recommend you allow yourself plenty of time to hang and find the solution that works best for your situation.

Donut Stands

These donut stands are my favorite addition, they add a little height to the table and really put the donuts on display. All I did was find some wood paper towel holders at my local thrift store, sand and paint them. If you look really closely you will see they are all different. Now I don’t know if I was just lucky in finding these, I only had to go to one thrift store and I found two wood paper towel holders. I also happened to have an old one sitting around at home. Hopefully you will have good luck too, the wood ones seem to be out of favor right now, so you many find them easily at your thrift store too. If can’t find any, here is how to make a donut stand from scratch with Tatertots & Jello DIY Donut Stacker that you can make yourself.

SUPPLIES

wood paper towel holders
screwdriver
pliers
sand paper
tack cloth
food safe paint **
foam brush
wood filler / putty

How to

REMOVE EXCESS PART: Unscrew the center post from the base of the paper towel holder. Remove the smaller post if there is one. One of the holders I bought, the smaller outer post that keeps the paper from unraveling, left a screw sticking up from the base when I took it off, so I used pliers to work it out. Then fill any extraneous holes with wood filler.
SAND: Sand down any of the wood parts you are going to use, for me that was just the round base and the center post. Make sure to get the clear coat off so the paint will adhere well. Then use a tack cloth to clean the surface.
PAINT: I pained my donut stands white using an acrylic paint. **Acrylic paint is non-toxic and since it wasn’t going in anyone’s mouths directly and it was a single use item, I decided acrylic would work for my situation. However, my use of acrylic paint in this project is no way a recommendation to use acrylic paint as a food safe paint. From my research milk paints are non-toxic and food safe but please do not take my statement as fact and do your own research to find a safe food paint.