PaperArtsy Blog 2019: Year in Review Topics 11-15

 

 Hi again from PaperArtsy HQ,
Hope you've had a lovely Christmas Day. Ours was full of laughter and Christmas cocktails, the fun part of kids being older is they are very hands on helping out to make the whole day lots of fun, and not at all stressful! Most enjoyable! Perhaps you have a few days off this week to enjoy some time with friends and family. I hope so! I know I shall be finding time to get creative as just around the corner we have our January new product announcements starting! EEEEK!

I'm finding it hard to wrap my head around the reality that we are on the cusp of starting the 20th year into this decade. How did that happen! The Millennium celebrations still seem quite recent to me! Time does fly!! And so has 2019.

Tonight I'm sharing my picks from Topics 11-15: Retro Colours, Eyes, Mushrooms, Inchies & Twinchies and Coral. I hope you'll join me in remembering just a few posts from each topic that our expert blogging team had fun creating for your enjoyment.

Leandra 

Topic 11: Retro Colours

So much flexibility in this topic leads to all kinds of combinations, Nikki (above) nailed what I was imagining with that 1970's vibe that always involved a touch of brown and warm orange reds.

Miriam Grazier used the shaving foam trend to great effect with her choice of a retro colour combo. Bright and geometric too, also reminding me of the 1970's.

From Anneke we saw this mood that reminded me of the 80's - fashion was so pastel-led at that time, as was home interior decor. This combination certainly evokes those memories for me.

I adored how Jennie created this gel-printed layered  beauty. Here Vintage layers are always so gorgeous.

 

Here's a better look at that previously mentioned post from Nikki. Retro colours and retro stamps from the Cat's Meow collection!

Topic 12: Eyes

When it comes to stamps, if there is a face involved, the eyes are very important. There is a mystery with eyes too; the expression can often imply so much emotion - happy, sad, questioning, thoughtful. But you won't be surprised with this topic that the bloggers interpret things perfectly in their own way!

My first pick was this amazing Egyptian creation by Chris Dark.

I really loved this from Jenny Marples. I'm not much of a fan of purple, but I absolutely adore this project, and the purple looks amazing! The colours and how she built the layers was just wonderful to read about. She has such a gentle way of applying paint to a surface to get incredible effects. There is something to be said for applying with a light touch. That gorgeous stamp is a newer one from the Lynne Perrella collection. Stunning.

I adored how Ellie used her images so effectively. The cool blue colour scheme, and striking contrasts, the textures and the infusions bring great depth to this book cover.

And Etsuko created this wonderful little tin full of cards that you can record people's contact details on. Very cute.
 

Topic 13: Mushrooms
 

We have noticed that people just love to use mushrooms in their art. Perhaps mushrooms offer a nice alternative to flowers or trees? They seem to creep into our autumnal art and  we have many mushroomy options scattered across all our stamp collections.

Ellie created this framed piece with JoFY stamps, it was a tribute to a well loved childhood story too.

And I hope you didn't miss Chris Dark who cleverly used a Kay Carley stamps to create the shape of her mushrooms, then painted them so perfectly, all shared in detail within her step-outs in the post.

Helen Chilton with infusions - I adored how she took some Zinski Xmas trees and turned them into mushrooms from deep within a spooky forest!

Additionally from  Carol Fox this lovely lantern showcasing a scrapcosy mushroom. love how the tea light allows the design to glow perfectly.

Topic 14: Inchies and Twinchies

It's been a long time since we did such small art!  It is very cool how small pieces of art can allow you to look at your stamps in a totally different way. Using just a tiny bit can shine a whole new light on the possibilities!

I really like how Lotte often layers up her images in different shades of ink to create both background and focal layers with various stamps in different depths of colour. Even on the smallest space this is possible!

Corrie used her inchies to go big. This is a great idea, stamping onto card, then cutting it up and rearranging the sections. You can read more about it here.

Helen Chilton made these great jewellery items, and I love how they feature on top of a tag with the same images slightly washed out beneath. She used Kay Carley's summer 2019 stamps. The tiny details work well with the matching stencil.

Additionally we saw some cubes (eg. Alison below), mini books, and cards, the ideas were all so beautiful. I hope you get a chance to go back and look at the things the bloggers created. Link to the start of each topic is in the intro at the top of this post.

Topic 15: Coral (Colour)

As the colour of 2019, we could not ignore Coral, and as luck would have it, we also announced the start of our revamped arrangement of Fresco Paints (see here) into families of 6 shades. The 'peachy Keen' family is a group of shades of coral. A perfect starting point for this topic!

Alison Bomber created a wonderful colourway on a series of Lynne Perrella tags using coral and soft garden greens. Tinting her ribbon with paint, and adding clever painterly effects, she really brings the images to life with a delicate touch.

Josefine created this dreamy journal entry with clever use of ink, brown infusions and paints. Lots of puddled watery applications and suddenly she has made this! The ship looks almost ghost-like stamped in the coral inks. There's a video embedded in the post so you can watch closely how she achieves this effect. Very inspirational!

I adored how Miriam created this stunning background paper with Gwen's stamps and paints. What a wonderful selection of colours! A beautiful result.

Carol made a cool 'Bee' charm with fabric for her brother who has bee hives. She presented it on this tag made with Tracy Scott stamps and stencils. 

There is so much more I could share, like this stunning layout by Scrapcosy, but I really do have to stop somewhere!

I'll see you again in a couple of days with the final review instalment, before we commence our New Product announcements as we cross into the New Year. Thanks for joining us on a trip down memory lane of 2019. Here's to a lovely boxing day rest, for those of you still enjoying the Xmas public holiday

Leandra