How to Make an Altar Icon for Prayer and Devotion

The first thing you need is an image. This can be a depiction of a saint, deity, animal spirit or anything that you focus your prayer on. The guardian angel and Saint Dymphna pictures I used were found at Wikimedia Commons and are in the public domain. But greeting cards are great for this craft as well as novena cards. You can also use your own drawing or mixed media collage. This is a great project to use recycled materials.

You will need the following items to complete this project:

• A piece of wood or a plaque the desired size. The one I used was about 8 x 10.


• Scissors or paper cutter.


• Your image.


• Card stock in color of choice (optional).


• Acrylic craft paint for wood.


• Foam brush or paint brush.


• Glue. I used Mod Podge.


• Spray sealant. I used a coat of Mod Podge first and then the spray as it cuts down on stickiness.


• Separate paint or sponge brush for glue.

Prepare the wood if you have to sand it. If you buy a ready-made plaque, then you can skip this step. Paint the wood the color of your choice. Let dry. You may need two to three coats.

If you've printed an image from the computer, cut it out. Or use a ready-made image such as a greeting card or novena card. Use the card stock as a background complimentary piece to help the colors of the image stand out. As a general guide, you can cut it to one inch out from all sides of the image, more or less to your taste.

Glue the background paper to the center of the wood and let dry. Then glue the image to the center of the background paper and let dry. Seal with a coat or two of Mod Podge and let dry. Spray with one or two coats of sealant.

I didn't put hangers on the back of my icons. But this is up to you. Picture hanging hooks are good for this.

For the guardian angel icon, I used a piece of wood that had to be cut from a larger piece. Because of the saw I had at the time, the edges came out kind of rough and sanding them didn't work completely. I was disappointed at first but then decided to give the wood an antiqued, beat-up look with the paint. I'm really happy with the results.

I did this by using white acrylic paint as the background color (three coats). Then I used the foam brush to brush on brown antiquing gel and wiped it off with a tissue. The residual brown color went into the crevices giving the wood an aged appearance. You don't have to use special antiquing gel however. Just water down some acrylic paint very thin in a color darker than your base color. Use it the same as you would the gel. You may have to work in smaller spots and more quickly with the thinned acrylic paint as the gel is formulated to give you time to wipe it off before drying.

The Saint Dymphna icon below was made with a ready-made plaque and painted with blue acrylic paint.

I glued a piece of felt to line the back of my icons. This is optional but I believe it cuts down on rough wood scratching other surfaces. A ready-made plaque won't have this problem. You could also wrap the icon in fabric if you're storing it when not in use.

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