2020 #2 A Hint of Spring: Cherry Blossom Gift Box with ESA Minis {by Jenny Marples}

2020 Topic 2: A Hint of Spring

With a beautiful project to herald Spring, Jenny has created a soft and sumptuous box full of texture and details and some great tips for distressing your projects.

Hi everyone, it's Jenny Marples (of Pushing The Right Buttons) with you today sharing A Hint of Spring in the form of a Cherry Blossom Gift Box.

Whilst many of us long for warmer, lighter days here in the UK, the Japanese eagerly await the flowering of the Sakura to herald the arrival of Spring. Being a huge fan of all things oriental I immediately thought of cherry blossom when seeing one of Seth Apter's new mini stamps (EM50) and it sparked the idea of creating a collage style box.

Below is a tutorial to show you how this came together and to share some ideas for using Seth's latest Minis in combination with the Soft Pinks and Khaki Greens Fresco Finish Acrylic Paint sets to achieve a gentle, delicate look to your finished projects.

I assembled the new Eileen Hull Designs Gift Box from thick board and painted it. After adding a layer of Winter Green Acrylic Paint I applied candle wax followed by black gesso so that as the box is handled it will naturally acquire signs of ageing, with hints of the deep green shade showing through in the scratches and scrapes. 

Needing a surface that could remain flexible when painted yet strong enough to cope with stitching I opted for an off-cut of textured wallpaper. This was covered in one coat of Lichen Acrylic Paint.

Seth's EM55 stamp was used in a repeating pattern across the paper using Khaki Acrylic Paint, and I then used a brayer to add random patches of more Lichen Acrylic Paint to get that slightly worn wallpaper look.

Torn scraps of thicker cheap watercolour paper were covered with Honey Dew Acrylic Paint before being overstamped with Seth's EM56 stamp using more Lichen Acrylic Paint.

To provide some contrast to the pale greens I painted some thinner copier paper with Seth's new Gold Rush Acrylic Paint before overstamping with his new Heavy Cream Acrylic Paint and EM49 stamp.

  

The next piece of paper was actually left over from the Valentine's box shared here earlier this month; a combination of Blush, Rose and Gold Rush Acrylic Paints were brayered over each other before being die cut to create lace effect pieces. 

After cutting the wallpaper into squares big enough to cover each side of the gift box, the various painted, stamped and die cut pieces were edged with Walnut Stain Distress Oxide Ink and glued in place to form five identical collages (the base of the box was covered just with one of the wallpaper squares). As an extra touch of texture and detail I stamped and embossed Seth's EM54 stamp using his Vintage Beeswax Baked Texture Embossing Powder as shown below. Once complete I used a template to stitch a traditional Japanese Sashiko pattern over each collaged square to help unify the background and add more texture.

The blossom panels were created by stamping Seth's EM50 image onto tea stained copier paper with (appropriately enough) Cherry Blossom Acrylic Paint. They were then mounted onto thicker card and edged with more Walnut Stain Distress Oxide Ink.

I created branches to lay over each stamped panel by painting kraft card with Gold Rush and White Fire Acrylic Paint before die cutting each shape.

A combination of Blah Mange and Rose Acrylic Paints were added to a strip of plain cotton calico - I found following Leandra's tip of mixing the paints with a fabric medium before applying them ensured the coverage was a lot smoother and easier.

Individual blossoms were die cut from the painted fabric using Eileen Hull's Stitchy Flowers dies and after shaping them with a ball tool, I added a drop of Liquid Pearls into the centre of each one, allowing them to air dry.

Finishing the box was then simply a case of assembly; after adding the square collages to the sides and top of the box I glued the blossom panels, branches and flowers in place on the sides as can be seen below.

In order to add some dimension to the top of the box lid I used some white wire edged ribbon to form a bow, inserting the die cut branches and flowers to enhance it further. A hot glue gun is definitely recommended for this stage! Below are some close ups so you can see more of the details.

And here's the finished Cherry Blossom Gift Box in full again.

I really enjoyed combining this softer colour palette with Seth's stamps and hope it gives you ideas for looking at his images as more than just backgrounds to be used with the punchier shades.

Thanks so much for stopping by.

Jenny

Blog: http://pushingtherightbuttons.blogspot.com 

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