2015 #17 Walk On The Moors {by Darcy Wilkinson PA. Signature Designer}

 2015 Topic 17: Pigment Powders

Hi everyone, Darcy here.  This is such a great topic, I have had my Brushos for more years than I can remember and it is wonderful to see them becoming popular again. I first used Brushos with textiles, so that is what I have gone back to today. I live around 20 minutes from the beautiful North Yorkshire Moors, and these are my inspiration for this project. All those yummy blues, greens and purples of fields and heather take my breath away. 

Top Tip: Put some damp paper towels or kitchen roll down on your desk, under and around your working space. These powders will travel, no matter how careful you are. They will fall and be held in place by the damp towels, making your clean up much easier. 

I began with a piece of 12" x 9" watercolour paper. I washed this with Turquoise at the top and Lime Green at the bottom. I then covered this with scrunched cling film and left it to dry. 

The next technique is to apply masking fluid, droplets at the top and lines at the bottom. Once this was dry I washed over the page with Cobalt Blue and Leaf Green. Again it is left to dry and then the masking fluid can be rubbed off. 

My next layer involves making patterns with a candle, then adding another wash of colour. once dry the page can be heated and the candle wax wiped away. 

The above three techniques are masking techniques, each prevents the ink reaching certain parts of the page. this next one is a removal technique. I used household bleach and stamps from EDY09 and EDY10 to add the birds and grasses.

Dip the stamp into some bleach and tap off, then take to the page and press down, the stamp needs to be held in place a few seconds longer than usual. When you lift off the stamp you will see that the image is bleached out.

Clean your stamp immediately to remove leftover bleach and work in a well ventilated area. 

EDY09

Once the bleach was dry on the page, I over-stamped the birds using Watering Can Archival ink.

Now to create the heather of the moorlands. I dropped Brusho crystals directly onto damp babywipes, and then heated them with a heat gun. this not only dries the babywipe and ink but also causes the wipe to shrink and curl, creating great texture.

I ripped the pieces up and layered them onto the page. I secured them with just a little glue. 

I coloured some thread with Brushos and gathered lots of different sized beads.

Next came an evening of beading and adding French knots with the coloured thread. I stitched right through the babywipe fabric and the watercolour paper. making sure each piece was secured.

I love how it looks now, the bright blue open sky, the colours of the heather, and the beads acting as small moorland flowers.

I spritzed some white cotton fabric with water and then dropped on some more Brusho crystals. Once dry I stamped up the stems and leaves and flowers from EDY10

EDY10

I layered this fabric with thick vilene and then a backing fabric and outlined each piece with free machine embroidery. Then these were all cut out. I also did a few small flowers from HP1009.

Finally I coloured some smoothy card with Brushos  in Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine and Purple. I stamped the butterfly from HP1301, then cut this out.

I gave it 2 coats of Satin Glaze and attached it to the page using matte gel. The stems, leaves and flowers were stitched in place with more beads added to the centres. 

I had such fun making this, it really took me back to my textiles and embroidery days. We are so lucky to be able to mix together so many interesting mediums. I hope it gave you some ideas.

Remember that Brushos are not permanent, only use them on fabrics that will not be laundered.

Darcy. x

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I will be demoing and doing make and takes at Stampers Grove in Edinburgh on Sat 3rd October. and teaching an all day workshop there on Sun 4th October. There are still places available on both days. Ring them to secure a place. 

We would love you to join in with challenge #17: Pigment Powders If you are inspired by any of our guests who blog with us over the fortnight, then please join in and link up your creativity HERE. 

All links go in the draw to win a voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. The Pigment Powders link will close 17:00 (London Time) Sunday, Sept 27th winner will be announced 2 hours later at 19:00.