tofa: up cycled project

Saturday, 1 August 2015

A creative short cut!

Hello Crafty peeps…

Welcome to my page today and hoping this month goes well for all! I am sharing my DT project for Rhedd’s Creative Spirit where the challenge is always Anything Goes but only mixed media or altered art, no cards please!

Before I get to share what I made, would like to ask you if you have at any point chosen a short cut to creating any project? You have an idea in mind and can’t wait to see the final picture and so you chose a short cut method so that the project gets over fast….have you done that?

I had to do it here! I was so blown away by various artists who have played with polymer clay and have done some lovely art tiles with it. I wanted to do it but who had the clay and moreover I was not going to wait for a day for the clay to dry and then assemble it on my project! And so…I chose the short cut…yes my very first faux clay tile!

I have altered yet another biscotti box here…given to me by a dear friend (the empty box, lol)…she knew I would love to play with it! Thanks Anu…

After the previous vintage makeover to a biscotti box which you can see here, I wanted something bright, ornate and colorful and so this is what I made…

Step 1- I sponged the lid with gesso and purple acrylic paint to get this lovely lavender shade. The sponging gives a natural texture which I like for all my boxes! As the lid was drying, I decided to make my tiles.

Step 2- I cut out strips of different sizes from an empty cereal box and layered 2 pcs to get some thickness. I gessoed them and gave texture with some modeling paste, TCW flowers and damask stencil and Prime basket weave stencil. Blasted a heat gun to dry them fast…remember I said shortcut!

Step3 – once the pcs were dry, I applied some brown black acrylic paint to all of them and then used metallic acrylic paints to given hints of color to the raised portion of the relief. I just took some paint on my finger and brushed them on top randomly. I have used blue and green paints and where they merged, there was a lovely purple shimmer!

Step 4- I rubbed in old gold Inka gold to mute the bright colors a bit and voila, my faux clay tiles are ready! That’s not even short cut, its like fast food, lol! I stuck some blingy colored crystals for grandeur!

Step 5- Now for the focal tile. Since there was grandeur all around, I chose to keep the focal tile simple. I stamped this lovely winged Ivy Goddess from Paper Artsy, Eclectica by Elizebeth Borer onto black CS and heat embossed in gold. The edges of the tile are inked with purple shimmer and have edged all the tiles with old gold. I decided to keep the tiles matte and hence no glossy accents or varnish.

Step6- By now, the lid was dry and I placed my tiles on top and further decorated the box corners with some blue crystals . Colored the base with some brown acrylics and gesso and rubbed in Inka gold.

Step 7- The closure is a modge mold resin which I have colored with blue alcohol inks and rubbed Inka Gold. I loved the antique look.

The little ornate feet has been given an antique look and just perfect for this box.

I was fortunate that the inside of the box was already a dull gold and so I kept is that way.

Here is a closer look at the Ivy Goddess in all her grandeur!

That’s a lot of bling, quite unusual of me and yes I managed to do all of this in flat 2 hours! I know this is no match to the original clay tiles but shortcut is all about reaching there early right! If you have short cut story, do share.

Hope this inspires you all to play along and would love to see your creations linked as soon as possible. Do have a look at all the wonderful creations by the design team here.

I would like to have my Ivy Goddess enter the following challenges…

Crafty cardmakers Challenge- Anything But a card

Shopping ourStash Challenge blog- add bling

Crafting bydesigns – AG