2015 #1 Her Light Extends {by Alison Bomber}

2015 Theme 1: Fragile Papers

Hi everyone, Alison here from Words and Pictures, joining you this evening with a post on the theme of fragile papers. I use tissue paper and book pages a lot in my crafting, so this was right up my street.  I thought of doing some tissue-paper stamping to add to texture, like my December journalling page, but then I got a sneak peek at the new Lynne Perella stamps - wow! - and plans changed.  It had to be stained glass with candlelight shining through... 

I started by hacking a book to pieces.  It's okay, it's a fairly pulpy hardback bought at a charity shop, so I feel fine about it.  I measured the size of the stamp I was using and used a sharp craft knife to cut an aperture in the front cover to fit.  And then began the slow but necessary task of slicing out the internal pages to create my candle nook.

I stamped my stained glass window lady onto some of the Waxed Tissue in White using Jet Black Archival ink and heat set it.  She's from one of the new Lynne Perella plates which will be coming your way in February.

At this stage, I could actually quite happily have stopped - there's something very appealing to me about the monastic simplicity of this - the stamp alone is so beautiful - or even of the candle nook without the "glass" in place at all, but that's for another day!!

I used Inktense pencils to colour her as I wanted a strong hit of colour to try to capture that intensity of tinted glass.  You can really make the most of the fine detail of a stamp like this, and with the water stage you can also get some really subtle shading.

For the cover, I wanted the light to emanate out from the window, so once I'd selected, arranged and glued my metallic pieces - mainly Finnabair Mechanicals with a few extras thrown in - I started by covering the whole lot with white gesso, and then drew some black gesso in from the outer edges before starting to add colour with translucent Fresco Paints. The first stage was Limelight coming out from the centre, and next I brought Inky Pool in from the outside edges.

I then continued to layer in colours - pale from the inside, darker from the outside - highlighting and shading with the Limelight and Inky Pool plus Zesty Zing, Beach Hut and South Pacific.

And once that was working for me, I added further highlights to catch the light using Treasure Gold in White Gold and Aquamarine.  I used the Treasure Gold on the page edges too, to create the look of aged, gilded book pages.

The words in the Ornate Plate form the other main inspiration behind the whole piece, along with the Lynne Perella stamp.  Illa lucem extendebat is Latin for "her light extends", and the phrase has been beautifully set to music by Helen Chadwick (the composer not the artist).  I was singing it in my head throughout the process.

Obviously, this would be a lot safer if you used a battery tealight - I shan't be leaving this one burning without being in close attendance!  You could try the simple b&w version if you don't fancy the colouring; or if you don't want to do the book carving you could simply cut an aperture in a tag and create your tissue paper window that way.  In any case, I hope you'll be inspired to play with tissue-paper-stamping and light, and with the graduating light to shade of the paintwork.  Thanks so much for stopping by today - it's always fantastic to hear what you think.  See you again soon!  Alison xx

Oh Alison, what a wonderful way to use this stamp as a lit-up niche! And you have blended the Fresco paints so marvellously well for your Finnabair inspired cover. I much prefer to use paints this way on the layered bellies, you have so much more control than a spray, and the specific and controlled use of Treasure Gold to carefully to highlight the texture of the embellishments is the PERFECT way to accent. you have done a truly beautiful piece here, thank-you so much!

We would love you to join in with challenge #1: Fragile Papers. If you are inspired by any of our guests who have blogged on this topic over this 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. This link will close 17:00 (London Time) Sunday, Jan 18th 2015, winner will be announced 2 hours later at 19:00.

2013 Christmas Cracker Video #3 {Painted Clusters}

Hello Everyone, Leandra here, for another Christmas Cracker of an idea

2013 Christmas Cracker Video #3 : Painted Clusters

There are so many embellishment items out there that can be added to your projects to add dimension and textural interest.
For example:

• metal charms
• embellishments (Prima Mechanicals, Finnabair Vintage Trinkets, Ideaology)
• paper and Fabric flowers
• resin cast frames, icons, birds and dimensional beads
• Buttons
• wooden die cut figures, tokens
• Vintage keys

We often use these items to add interest to photo or mirror frames, scrapbook layouts, assemblage-mixed-media 3D constructions,  journal pages, etc. Using such items doesn't have to be complicated, how about using dimensional things for a little birthday gift card or a gift-tag to accompany a bottle of wine. Or what about making a wearable item, like a brooch or vintage style hair piece for a special event.

If you go to the Prima website (they make the most striking embellishments which, of course, crafters love) you will see loads of examples from their assorted designers using lots of these kinds of embellishments. Generally it involves a lot of flowers, and gorgeous colour combinations.  

I particularly love Finnabair's take on this trend of clustering, in fact, if you go waaaay back on her blog she would use lego, wire coils, spark plugs and all manner of found objects.  Anna is certainly a cluster queen; she manages to arrange an assortment of objects so beautifully, and typically she will spray on top with dye sprays, or paint with metallic paints.

Inspired by Finn the week before Christmas I made (and blogged) a simple white heart for the wall of hearts we have in the kitchen. I thought it would be nice to show you another twist on this idea in a video. This time I'm using shades of dark pink and purple frescos (yes really!) which will be accented with Treasure Gold.

 

First I applied the tinted Grunge Paste (Spanish Mulberry) to the canvas heart that I had cut from the canvas board in the last blog post. And used a palette knife to create texture, and then used  a heavy gel to secure the embellishments while the GP was wet.

Fresco paints grab perfectly to metal, no need for gesso first like you would for most other brands of acrylic. Just apply the fresco opaques directly to the metal, glass, acrylic etc With projects like this you need to use a strong gel, leave to set for 24 hrs, then start layering the paint in and around all the nooks and crannies.

It's always interesting to see the transformation that takes place when you add fresco paint and treasure gold to dimensional objects. We have done many versions of this type of projects in recent years, many of our ArtsyCrafts projects were created using this concept. 

So check out the video to see how I use the paints to transform this heart. Don't forget, if you want to join in and try out this technique, the details are at the foot of this post.

Cracker Ingredients:
Craft Tools: Soft paint brushes for paint and Treasure Gold
Prima: Mechanicals and other embellishments
Fresco Chalk Acrylics:  Spanish Mulberry, London Night, Squid Ink, Claret, 

Cracker Method:
In today's video we are arranging some items in a simple cluster, and exploring how PaperArtsy Chalky Fresco Paints with Treasure Gold dusted over can create a soft and delicate effect.

As you know, Frescos are designed to cling to any surface, and so they are easy to apply to metal, plastic, resin, wood and even glass. The natural tooth the chalky paint has allows the Treasure Gold to easily cling to the surface, and as Treasure Gold is permanent on any surface, it will not rub off. This technique is suitable for many crafting applications, so what are you waiting for?





Play Along:
Link how you have been inspired by this technique below. Play along and you will go in the draw to win a set of Limited edition paints and a brand new 2014 PaperArtsy A5 stamp set.

Link closes 17:00 Sunday Jan 5th 2014.

Winner for Christmas Cracker Video #3 will be announced 19:00 Sunday January 5th 2014.

Christmas {lurve} Hearts

Hi Everyone, Leandra here

As you know this time last year out kitchen was in a bit of a pickle as the builders were trying to finish it in time for Christmas. Well today, as we were putting the Xmas tree boxes back in the loft, I stumbled across the box of hearts that used to adorn a wall in the kitchen pre-makeover. They are all various shades of white, wood, neutral tones, so I instantly decided to reinstate the wall of lurve!!

No biggie, started arranging the hearts on the table, with a few new additions, and realised there was one that did not work with the rest. It was a creamy buttermilk shade, almost lemon, and it just did not look right with all the rest. So just as Emma was leaving work tonight at 5ish, I started the heart makeover (never thought I would blog this, so didn't get a 'before photo').... but here is the end result. It only took me about an hour to do. I started by digging out the bag of bits I took with me to the Finnabair class I went to a couple of weeks ago, and I think this piece is certainly Finn inspired.

I just plonked various bits directly onto the wood using a heavy body gel medium. The bits were things like mechanical flowers by Prima, a timmy knob, and some random poppers/snaps. Also a few leftover beads from the discontinued PaperArtsy Bijouterie collection, a resin bird, and so on. Zapped that with a heat gun till the gel was more or less set-ish.

Next I gave it probably 3-4 coats of snowflake fresco, stippling it on, drying, adding a bit more and so on until it all looked pretty even. 

I knew it needed to be distressed, so I put the smallest spot of Taupe Fresco onto the craft sheet, and made that into a liberal puddle with about a teaspoon of water, then dolloped that all over, and dabbed off excess with a paper kitchen towel.

As the wall or lurve is a pretty neutral arrangement, I decided Pewter Treasure Gold was probably the most suitable, but I do think that on the light tone frescos the paler shades of TG look better. I used the tiniest amount of Pewter (which has a light gold thread running through it) using one of the smallest scruffiest flat brushes possible to just highlight the texture of the embellishments.

So all that remains is to gather the courage to nail about 15 hearts onto the pristine wall!

But how cool would this be to do some tree embellishments! OMG, mind boggling with the possibilities!