2024 Topic 9 : Alison Bomber {by Victoria Wilding)

Hi everyone

Victoria here with you today.

It’s that rusty time of year, when all of the autumn colours are in their full glory and naturally spill over into our makes. And no-one does rust better than Alison Bomber, so taking a leaf from her book (see what I did there!), I was inspired to do my own paired back take on combining some of the stamps from her collection with some rusty autumn colours.

Embracing nature in words and pictures, lies at the very heart of Alison’s creative practice and forms the basis for her stamp collections. So it wasn’t too big of a stretch to incorporate this quarter’s theme of nature into my project. I decided to create a set of notelets, which can be bundled together to gift a friend. Combined with a few other elements, this handmade gift will be a one-of-a-kind package, crafted with love.

I’m not usually a hot colour fan, so lots of white space in the finished project, balances the strong colours which I used sparingly. This really helps to lead the eye to the details, whilst also giving space to rest whilst looking.

I started off by gathering my supplies. Firstly I selected some Alison Bomber stamp sets for my imagery. I knew I wanted words to be a particular focus on the notelets, so I went right back to the beginning and chose EAB01 Trees and Flowers, as the nature theme would tie in with the floral images. I am lucky to have a collection of Alison’s stamp sets, so I also chose EAB30 Violets Edition, EAB39 Pressed Foliage Edition, EAB40 Pressed Grasses Edition, EAB41 Pressed Umbels Edition, to use for the floral images, giving me a different floral for each notelet. If you don’t have as many sets, you could easily use just one set and have matching images on all the notelets.

I also selected some autumn colours from the Mattints range, picking out Ladybug, Greenstone Glow (MT01) and Squeezed (MT06). I also selected a Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic in Peach Nectar (FF144).

I picked out five, 4” square card blanks and envelopes, and cut five, 3.5” squares from Smoothy Card (SCA4) using my deckle edge trimmer for an uneven edge.

Then I started to create the main focal points for the notelets, stamping out quotes from EAB01 Trees and Flowers.

Next I stamped a floral on each of the cards.

Using a mix of black and grey Archival Ink, to create the illusion of depth between the images and words.

With the stamping complete, it was time to add some colour to the project.

 

I put out a small blob of each of the Mattints onto my craft mat, and using a small paint brush started to roughly apply the colour, not bothering to stay too closely in the lines.

This allowed me to create a halo of colour around the solid stamp designs, creating unity in all the cards as a collection.

Then I added some orange watercolour splatters and set aside to dry.

Next I created the base layers, to put the focal points on. Using scrap card, I cut five 3.75” squares and applied Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic in Peach Nectar (FF144) around the edge using a sponge. This is a great way to use up patterned card from your stash that you might not like that much.

Once dry I applied a rough, thin coat of glue on top of the paint.

And applied guilding flakes on top, removing the excess with a brush.

With the main elements for the notelets complete, it was time to start building the layers, using double sided tape.

Including attaching them to card blanks.

The patchy metallic highlight, look really effective against the bright peach of the paint, creating a real burst of autumn colour behind the main focal point.

To finish I stamped matching florals on the envelopes for the notelets, before bundling them all together with twine.

The finished notelets have a flush of autumn rust, that isn’t too overpowering and they look really great together as a set.

With five unique designs in the finished set, these will make a great gift for the recipient to use for sending handwritten messages or greetings, or for journaling/reflective writing.

I hope you feel inspired to make your own set of nature inspired notelets.

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Until next time, wishing you a happy creative week!

Victoria 

YouTube: www.youtube.com/victoriawildingcreates

Instagram: www.instagram.com/victoriawildingcreates

Facebook: www.facebook.com/victoriawildingcreates

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2024 Topic 9 : Alison Bomber {by Nikki Acton}

Hello everyone, Nikki (a2a.craft) here with you today sharing my project for our Designer Focus topic featuring Alison Bomber. Our theme this quarter is Nature, which I have included in several ways.

This is another of those projects that ended up quite differently to how I planned originally! Sometimes it is frustrating that the vision doesn't work out - but I do enjoy the journey of how differently things evolve.

This piece of wall art is mounted on 8x8 inch grey board with an additional 6 inch panel and a circle, both greyboard, creating some dimension.

In addition to Alison's quote stamp set - EAB14 - Happiness Edition, I have also used a stencil (PaperArtsy Stencil PS306 by Tracy Scott) to create the embossed leaves (with the text underneath - see more on this below) and also the fussy cut leaves. 

My main supplies are shown above - although I also used some PaperArtsy Printe Tissue paper. I chose earthy colours to reflect our Nature theme and some lovely Dragonfly Mattint for some contrast.

To start I took some PaperArtsy Smoothy Stamping Card and spritzed with water before sprinkling on Infusions Dye Stain - Lemocello and allowed this to dry.

I stamped over this with my selected quote from Alison's stamp set EAB14 using Ranger Archival Ink - Potting Soil. I then carefully sponged Versamark through stencil PS306 before heat embossing with clear powder. This seals the stencilled area allowing me to the add distress ink over the rest of card - keeping the stencilled area still showing the Infusions and stamped background.

I only added the embossing to half of this background.

For the larger panel and small circle - I added PaperArtsy Mattint (Dragonfly) before laying over a section (actually different leftover sections) from PaperArtsy Printed Tissue - Alison Bomber.

 

The first thing I decided to do with my layers was create a border / frame using the infusions/stencilled card stock. The was an A4 sheet - so I first cut it down to be 8x8 (the size of the large panel).  I then cut a 6x6 inch square from the middle to fit onto smaller grey board panel.

I highlighted the edges of my border/frame with a brown Sharpie before adhering to the larger panel.

Time to create some embellishments. I took a piece of card and added some Dragonfly Mattint before randomly stamping one of the Pressed Foliage stamps from PaperArtsy Stamp Set EAB39 (by Alison Bomber).

I then used the stencil from Tracy Scott to create some leaves/petals.

I also used Tracy's stencil to make these corner embellishments.

I collected some leaves, shells, stones and twigs to potentially add for our Nature them - but decided to use the twigs and made them into bundles.

Finally the focal quote - this was stamped onto some torn card with some PaperArtsy Mattint (Glow) added. I distressed the edges with some Ranger Distress Ink (Ground Expresso).

I then started adhering it all together. The grey board panels naturally add dimension and I raised the quote further by using foam pads.

The final piece! A great quote from Vincent van Gogh and very relevant for the Nature theme. I have also tried to reflect this in all the elements, colours and tones I have used.

Blog: Addicted to Art

Instagram: @a2a.craft

Pinterest: nikacton

YouTube: Nikki Acton