Your Patience Rewarded!

Loved being at the NEC (National Exhibition Centre), Birmingham this last weekend for the HobbyCrafts show. This is one of the Uk largest retail craft shows with thousands of people coming through every day to see all the stands. The show was different this year as it was relocated into hall 20, but very enjoyable with all the shows being in the one place. I thought it was a lot cooler as the space was bigger, all the different shows (Hobbycrafts, Art Materials and Christmas Gifts) were in the same hall, so it was easier to see them all. This meant there was more space, the aisles were wider. It was a new layout, so it took a while to get your bearings and work out where your fave sellers were, and there were not enough toilets, so many desperate ladies found the mens loos a better option! 

Here is part of our stand, you can see the paints and glimmers on the shelves, and the demo desk to the right.

Our stand was in the row which was half Hobbycrafts and half Art Materials, which fitted us as that was exactly the type of stuff on our booth! here is part of the top of my demo area...lots of stuff to hand to play with: glimmers, vivas, kaisers and textures.

People seemed fascinated with the textures I was creating onto chipboard or wood substrates like this one below which has been embellished with a piece of silver metal shaped to a mould and painted with black paint.

 We demoed a variety of ideas. Stamping on metal, embossing metal on moulds, stamping an image and puffing out (embossing) the metal in specific areas of the stamped image (as above). We also tried altering metal before stamping (with paint and glimmer mists), as well as altering the metal after stamping and embossing. 

Here is one of the moulds done with a coloured metal. Position a strip of coloured metal onto the mould and rub over with a paper stump. Start with a fat stump, and move to a thinner one to accentuate finer detail. Next work wround the mould with a rounded teflon tool then finally use a fine teflon tipped pointy tool to outline the detail in a sharp refined manner. Sand the raised parts of the mould with a sanding block. Fill the back of the embossed area with a polyfiller, then fix to humungo tape and cardstock, and add a border with a diagonal texture wheel. I used this to accent one of the door hangers which I had coloured in Pinks and oranges.

We also demoed textured backgrounds made with pastes, stamps, paints, and altered with paints (kasier colour or Viva Decor) and glimmer mists.

Texture Products

So let me show you in more detail the texture technique that caused such a buzz over the weekend. Everyone was loving this idea with either Terra or Ferro as a base. If you are going to paint over the top with either kaiser colour acrylics or with Viva metallics, it doesn't matter which base product you use or the colour of it, particularly if you are going to paint over the top. Terra is slightly thicker, it is an earthen-looking texture (think clay or terracotta) with a creamy-gritty texture. Ferro is a slightly softer texture, it's sparkly and rusty, so all the colours of that collection are very metallic-rusty looking. 

How to use texture

• You can stamp into both these products, but make sure to wet your stamp first. If it's damp it will release more easily from the texture.

• Apply your chosen product to the surface with a spatula, its nice to have some thick and some thin areas. Stamp into it. Set aside to dry (10 to 15 mins)

• If you don't like the image created, smooth over and re-stamp with a different image, or add more product if the texture is too thin. If the texture is too thick, thin it down a little with your spatula.
  

Using Paint on top of Texture

If you want a matte finish, then Kaiser colour acrylic Paints are the ones. These are a basic crafting acrylic, with a superb colour range. KaiserCraft (an Australian company) release paints regularly to match up with their scrapping papers, so the colours are on trend and the very matt finish is perfect for stamping on top of.

When using kaisercolours I choose a couple of light shades and a couple of darker shades. Eg Turquoise, coastal blue, Olive and Pistachio. Onto that was sprayed iridescent gold glimmer which has warmed it up and added some sparkle.

Other colours I like are in the dips Red and Tropical Waters and lighter on top with dusky pink , Coastal blue and white. 

 For autumnals, how about Raw Umber, raw sienna, terracotta , soft moss, olive and antique white. You can really use any colours, just make sure that they contrast with each other. 

 For the brights I adore Hot Pink, candy, Orange and Mango. White also looks great on top of this as do glimmer mists.

So now you have seen some colour ideas, how do we do it?

• First you want to paint the dips (the crevices created by stamping into the texture - see above). You can either put light or the dark colours into the dips. Use about 3-4 different colours randomly applied one at a time around pushed into the texture using the paint applied to cut and dry foam. Dry after painting each colour.

• Now you can bring a contrasting colour over the top. This colour need to be different to all those in the dips. If you have used a light shade in the dips, then put a darker shade on the riased areas, or if you have dark colours in the dips, then use a light colour on top.
  

• If you have a couple of colours on top then you start to add more interest to the piece. Below I have used Mocha and Coastal blue on the top, but in the dips was Raw umber and turquoise (the turquoise looks paler because it was sprayed with patina glimmer mist later whihc lightened it a little). How cool does that clock stamp look!! See it here. The script in Mini 44. A fave of mine!
  

• To finish you can add some glimmer mists for a touch of sparkle, or you can add sparkle with Viva decor Precious metal colour paints. Shake the bottle, open and dip your finger into the lid, then rub the paint over a few raised sections of your textured background. This sample below has Moroccan Brown terra as the base, then in the 'dips' are Olive and Raw sienna Kaiser colour. Also we have Antique white to lighten and add contrast to the dips. You can see a little Viva Gold is rubbed over some of the bumpy areas on top too.
  

So there you have it for now. I'll post some more later this week about other techniques I demoed at the NEC. Have a great week!!


Leandra