MIxed media with maps ATCs

The theme for December's monthly ATC swap was 'Mixed media using maps'.

I had a plan.  It depended on a stamp. I couldn't find the stamp.

This is 'plan B', using maps in a much m ore subtle way, which I rather like!

I started with a background made by gluing newsprint to cardstock, then using an old credit card to apply paint in reds, blues and purples. Using the credit card to spread the paint means it goes on very quickly, in a very thin layer, and dries fast. My background was too bright for me to use, so I added a layer of white gesso, again using the credit card. This gave a much more subtle effect.

The background looked a bit old and dusty, so I thought I'd go with the flow and add some cracked areas. I used a mask to keep the cracks off the area I planned to add my main image to. I used distress ink, which looked lovely, but which didn't dry properly on the gesso, despite using the heat gun, so I sprinkled with clear embossing powder and heated to 'fix' it.

Next came the main image, which I stamped with versamark, and embossed with 'blue raspberry' two tone embossing powder, for dramatic effect.

She didn't have quite enough dramatic effect, so I decided to make her stand out from the background a little more. I drew around her with an inktense pencil in what looked like a dull dark blue.  I added water,a and it turned out to be a much brighter blue than I expected!  I should have tested on a scrap of paper before I used it on the ATC! Still, it makes her 'pop'. 

You may have noticed that there's not much evidence of maps so far.  I had decided to use the map for embellishments.  I took a vintage map, dampened it with water, and coloured it with faded jeans and picked raspberry distress inks.

I cut small strips of map to use as 'ribbons' across the bottom f the ATCs, then added a few french knots with hand dyed thread. Next, I used a paper punch to cut out lots of flowers. I assembled these, and used a small white brad to hold them together and attach to the ATC.

Maple leaves book page

More maple leaves. This is my page in a collaborative hanging book, where each player was given a colour of the rainbow. We had an extra player, so we needed an extra colour, I added crimson to the rainbow :-)

As I'd drawn a maple leaf shape to use to draw around for my textured acrylic panel, I thought I'd use it again. I layered up some autumnal colours of organza with snippets of organza between the layers, then used my special Margaret Beal soldering iron to trace around the maple leaves. As I had spare layered organza left, I created more shapes to finish the bottom of the page off.

I painted a piece of canvas with quinacridone crimson fluid acrylic paint, then I sewed the maple leaves on using variegated threads. I finished the piece by adding dots of iridescent gold fluid acrylic, using the end of a a bamboo skewer.

I have everybody else's pages now, they were all gorgeous - I really must get around to binding them into the hanging book, and put them all on display.

Lutradur book

I made a little book out of Lutradur, gesso, woven brass 'fabric', and beads.

I used 2 pieces of Lutradur about 6 inches by 4 for the cover. I coloured them with fluid acrylic paints. Once dry, I used foam stamps and gesso to add images. If you look carefully, you can see gold shiny areas, I gently stroked on some treasure gold for texture and to break up the larger areas of colour a little.

I cut strips of woven brass 'fabric', punched small holes in them, and sewed them onto the front cover with french knots. I decided that I didn't want a closure to spoil the front cover so added a button to the back cover, and made a beaded loop to close over the button.  I also added beads to the pamphlet binding.

The inside of the book is also made of Lutradur, coloured and decorated in the same way but using slightly brighter colours.  I folded it to a pattern, the pockets are just the right size to tuck ATCs  into.

12 days of Christmas presents

Each year on the UK Art Swaps group, we run a '12 Days of Christmas' swap, where each player makes 12 small gifts, wraps and sends them to 'Mother Santa', who swaps them out and sends a set of 12 gifts to each player.

Some of us start opening one present a day from 12th December onwards, some wait until Xmas Day to open them all, and some probably open them all the moment the package arrives!

The hardest part of the swap is deciding what to make.  It needs to be reasonably small, and light, so that the postage doesn't cost too much. The cost of making the gifts is also a factor because when you're making 12 of something the costs can mount up quite quickly.

This year I decided to make some brooches.  I used some recycled wool fabric for the base, and needlefelted wool rovings onto both sides, to make a fairly sturdy felted fabric. 

I cut leaf shapes from this felt base, and machine sewed velvet leaf shapes onto them.  I used variegated Perle thread in my bottom bobbin to sew round the edges of the velvet, and the leaf 'veins'.

I sewed around each brooch a few times using metallic thread, so that each brooch has a subtle hint of glimmer.

To finish the brooches off, I got out my needles and thread and hand sewed french knots and beads to the fronts, and brooch backs to the backs.

I hope the recipients like them!

A closer view.

Fabric ATCs

I made these for the small international ATC swaps group I belong to.  

September's theme was 'woven', and this is my interpretation.

I used Ranger Adirondack color wash sprays to dye pelmet vilene, before cutting it up and weaving it together. I hand embroidered a 'darned/woven' area, and added small pieces of pelmet vilene with the words stamped on them.  To finish, I cut two circles of card and used a brad to attach them.

October's theme was 'fabric & fibres' and this is my interpretation.

I needlefelted scrim to a wool fabric base, then needlefelted some wool rovings to the back to bring subtle colour through to the front. I couched down some knitting yarn with Perle thread, and added a line of stitches in fine gold metallic thread.  I used toning and contrasting threads for the french knots and seed stitches, before  finishing the ATCs by backing them onto pelmet vilene with machine zigzag.

Another great Celyn Textiles class

I have really enjoyed myself yesterday evening and all day today, learning how to dye fabric, transfer designs onto fabric panels, use perle thread in the bottom of my sewing machine, and sew organza onto wood.  And one day I may even finish my wall hanging!

The class, taught by Sheila, was called 'Twisted', and this is the sample Sheila brought to show us.  The corduroy fabric used for the base, and the scrim embellished to it were hand dyed using procion dyes.

We soaked our fabrics in a mixture of water, baking soda and ash, wrung them dry, then squirted the fabric with various colours of dye (made from procion dye powder mixed with urea).  The fabrics dried overnight, and then we started working on them.  The image below is the back of my panel, and I drew the design for my panel on the back with an ordinary rollerball pen.  I forgot that the design would come out like a mirror image on the front, I wish I'd remembered to reverse it when I drew it!

We then cut the dyed gauze/scrim into pieces, made holes in it, distorted it and generally made it shabby before using the embellishing machine to adhere it to the corduroy.

Once the scrim was in place, we 'drew' our designs with machine stitching.

The next step will be to fill in all the motifs with machine embroidery, but I had forgotten to take my free motion embroidery foot with me so I had to skip that step!

Sheila had the fantastic idea of using florist 'canes' (balsa wood?) as a 'frame' for leaves and shapes made from organza.  

I had a great time in the class, and hope to finish this panel - I'll post a pic when I do.  Meanwhile, the other class members were generous enough to let me take pictures of their half finished pieces to share here, so you can see the variety of pieces which will spring from this class. Don't forget that you can enlarge an image by clicking on it.

Lovely birdie, beautiful colours....

Fabulous colour contrast...

Autumnal rusty shades and beautifully embroidered flowers....

A fishy business...

Variegated threads....

And fabulous free motion work with gold thread.....

Great class with a great bunch of women - and I'm looking forward to the next class in January!

A little printing and stitching

I tried a little fun foam printing onto fabric. I cut a piece of fun foam to about 2 x 4 inches, then drew my design with a biro - pressing hard to make deep marks.

I used a sponge to apply Stewart Gill fabric paints to my 'printing plate', then pressed it onto the fabric.

I chose some really pretty perle embroidery thread, which I have been hoarding for ages, and started to embroider over the printed design. Only two stitiches - seed stitiches and french knots.

Once the hand embroidery was finished, I backed the lightweight cotton fabric with heavier fabric, and machined a small zigzag stitch around the edge.  I like the finished postcard, not at all my usual colour palette, but summery - which is more than I can say for the weather!

Brown paper ATC

I tried out a new-to-me mixed media technique for this ATC and am rather pleased with the results.

Take some brown (kraft) paper, an inch or so larger all around than your finished piece, and crumple it up. Crumple and uncrumple a few times till you like the texture.

Cut a piece of iron on interfacing to at least the size of your finished piece, and iron it on. The paper now feels more like fabric than paper, and won't tear where the interfacing is adhered.

Turn the paper over, raw an outline of your finished piece in pencil. Stick some pieces lace or other deeply textured textile on - I used gel medium to stick mine.

Take some perle embroidery thread - different weights would be nice, I only used one because an ATC is pretty small - and sew. I used stitches to ensure that the lace was anchored, and also as part of the design of my finished piece. The stitches are simple - blanket stitch, fly stitch, straight stitches and french knots.

Take some gesso and paint over everything you've done. I know, you just did all that embroidery - don't worry, it will all look good in the end!

Once the gesso is dry, paint over it with dark acrylic paint - I used Golden fluid acrylic in Paynes Grey (which I think is more of a blue!). Be sure to get the paint into all the texture - this will probably take 2-3 coats.

Once the paint is dry, rub all over with a gilding wax - I used Treasure Gold in sapphire. You could use rub'n'buff, or a Liberon product.

Finally, highlight all that texture with a contrasting colour of gilding wax - I used Treasure Copper - you need to have a very light touch for this part as you need to avoid getting the contrasting colour on the background (as far as you are able).

I'm really pleased with the end result, it has 'wow' factor - I will use this technique for other projects.

Autumnal colours mixed media postcard

Autumnal colours of browns, reds, oranges, yellows and greens... inspiration is all around me.

I made this postcard by painting some canvas with 2 or 3 colours of Golden fluid acrylic paints, then sewing small silk squares onto it using perle and metallic threads and embroidery stitches. The whole thing was mounted onto a piece of painted watercolour paper, which I swiped with a dark brown Stazon inkpad.

Felted & embroidered ATCs

I know. You'll be shocked. I've made some art and am posting it to my blog. I have actually made more art recently but haven't found the oomph to upload it. I made these this morning and was so pleased that I thought I'd share.



These were made by using the embellishing machine to felt all sorts of bits and bobs of silk, organza, fibres, rovings, bits of silk rods and more to a base of emerald green felt. Once felted, I added the odd hand embroidered stitch, some sequins and a couple of organza 'flowers'.

Needless to say, they look much better in real life - really vivid colours.

Altered Element surface design pack - more twisting Tyvek

I thought I'd try another way of working with Tyvek, so I gave one side of this piece a thin layer of watered down fluid acrylics in Nickel Azo Gold, and Jenkins Green.


Once the paint was dry, I cut the piece in half, and turned one piece over so that the painted side faced down. I covered the Tyvek with silicone baking paper, and used my iron to distort it. This is a process where you don't have much control, Kim Thittachai says the secret is to 'kiss and caress' the paper with the iron (definitely don't apply any weight or pressure, the iron should hardly touch the paper). The tyvek always distorts so that the 'creases' are nearest the iron, and the rounded 'valleys' are furthest away.

If you click on the picture below to enlarge it, you can see that the piece on the left is the side where the unpainted side was nearest the heat of the iron, and the rounded areas are more prominent, whereas the piece on the right had the painted side nearest the heat and the creases are more prominent.


My tyvek now had interesting texture and shape, but I wasn't sure what to do next. So, I cut one piece up, using the lines which had formed when the Tyvek was distorting. That gave me some interesting shapes. And then I had a moment of madness and decided to attempt an abstract embroidery piece!


I used my embellishing machine to create a piece of wool and silk felted fabric to use as a background. I then laid one of the Tyvek pieces on top, and used some hand painted silky thread to attach the Tyvek using some irregular cross stitches. The Tyvek was surprisingly easy to stitch through.

I finished the piece by adding some french knots to the background, and some beads tothe Tyvek, to give the piece more texture. You can see some of the detail in the pictures below.


I think I'll use this as a book cover.

Beryl Taylor inspired art

I made this piece for a swap Sweetpea is running on CC Swaps. The swap requirement was that whatever we made had to be inspired by or in the style of Beryl Taylor. I love Beryl's work and have made several paper quilts in the style of her work. I decided to be a bit more ambitious and adventurous this time, and go for a fabric paper and embroidery project.

Fabric paper is a fabulous base for mixed media - and very simple to make (although it does take a long time to dry). You just take a piece of fabric - gauze or fine cotton - and paint it with watered down PVA white glue (the cheaper the better). Lay some scraps of tissue paper or thin gift wrap down onto the fabric and paint with more glue. Leave gaps between the scraps. Add torn strips of white tissue paper along with more glue, to cover the whole thing. While the glue is still wet, add a wash of watered down fluid acrylic paints in 2 or 3 colours. Leave to dry overnight.

I glued my fabric paper to a layer of felt, then cut nine 2 inch squares from the sheet. I machine stitched around the edges of each square, using gold thread. I stamped some medieval text onto the squares using Stewart Gill Metallica bright gold paint applied to the stamp with a colorbox sponge tool. I edged the squares with more paint. I took a square of mount board and covered it with velvet, then mounted my squares onto it with gel medium.



Having created a background, I needed to add the decorative focal point to the piece. I wanted this to stand out from the background, so applied a thin layer of white gesso over my fabric paper. I hand drew a design copied from a medieval tile from Strata Florida Abbey, the resting place of several Welsh Princes, and cut it out from the fabric paper. I layered it onto some deep blue-green fine netting, machine embroidered the centre, and the outer ring, then hand embroidered the cut out using gold thread, and added some beading. The photo below shows the piece with the gold thread work almost complete but not yet beaded.


I cut small diamonds from fabric paper and painted them with a coat of transparent iron oxide, then added them to the circle around the design, with a bead in the centre of each. Finally, I mounted the circular piece onto the squares background. The background squares are much more vivid than the picture shows, and I'm really pleased with the finished piece.


I hope Sweetpea likes it too!