Em's Van

We bought a 1983 Toyata Hiace converted into a camper for a 6 month trip around Australia. It had a fridge, microwave, gas stove, sink, plenty of storage, 3 seats in the front and 2 with seat belts in the back plus a long seat. We added a hula girl on the dash, fluffy dice on the mirror, a smiley face spare wheel cover and prayer flags on the back window, where we collected stickers from where we went. The paint job was in need of redoing so we decided to paint it all retro! The curtains already had 70's style brown swirls but were old and tatty and the seats needed reupholstering.

Before:

 

Fixing some rust spots

Inside makeover:

We used some retro sheets from an Op Shop to sew into curtains by sewing on curtain backing fabric. We made them slightly bigger to keep out more light and had to fit them to the press studs on the van. We bought new furnishing fabric to upholster the seats, keeping with something that wouldn't clash with the bright curtains or get dirty too easily. We used the existing covers as a pattern and to work out how to do it. When we took off the fabric the untouched parts underneath were so clean and bright, making us realise how bad they really were. We used 1000 staples! It was easier than we thought to do it.

Before (notice damaged seats and curtains in breakfast pic)

The Design:

I created the design on illustrator keeping with 3 colours as we used house paints and they are expensive. Also ties in all sides and designs.

Left Side:

Steve sanded down the left side and heated off the stripes that were on the side of the van. We used an overhead projector to trace the design (handy being a school teacher).

Back

We decided on a quote to use and then I designed it in Illustrator and again traced the design onto the van to paint. It took a while to completely finish it because we had to do many coats of intricate parts. I think it turned out great! 

Doors:

We had to have a bit of fun and use a crash test dummy body painted onto the door!

Right side:

We wanted to have a map of Australia so we could draw the route we took on our Australia trip. And keeping with the retro style we painted the sunny Gold Coast skyline (where we lived at the time). I traced used the actual skyline to create the design. 

 

Map of where we went- I drew on at as we went!

Roof:

As added fun we painted a body outline on the roof. Steve traced me on butchers paper and then we cut it out to trace onto the roof. You wouldn't know it was there unless you looked down from above ;)