Challenge: Inspiration Francaise

    Bonjour my crafting friends. Whether it is some French script, a fleur de lis, or an element with the Eiffel tower on it, most likely you have some French-spiration somewhere in your crafting stash. Perhaps it is a Paris stamp, a map paper, or maybe you’d like to dress up an old champagne bottle. Maybe a favorite movie of yours is set in France and you utilize that as inspiration - c'est la vie.

 

    Wherever you find it, I look forward to seeing what you create this week as I’m such a fan of French food from macarons to champagne, of vintage French style, and of course, my favorite accessories in 2012 have been French General products! Viva la France! Let’s see what you’ve come up with.

Sarah immediately started quoting lots of cliché phrases in a rather bad French accent when she saw this challenge theme and that led to the inspiration for her quirky card.

I just couldn't resist a bit of Ooh la la and thought I'd also use the colours of the French flag too! I just love stamping in Archival Ink onto white card and seeing a fresh, crisp image appear so I grabbed my Wendy "It's Face Art" stamp set and my ink pads. I think Ranger's Vermillion and Cobalt Archival inks are just the right tones for the French look. My 'go to' flutterby, the Just Fly butterfly stamp, added a dimensional touch to the card as well as fun headdresses for my flying damsels.

For Tracy inspiration comes in the form of an altered French sardine tin.

My husband helped the cause this week, eating plenty of sardines for my creative endeavours. Inspiration began with the PARIS film collage stamp, a perfect backdrop for my tin. Colouring my tin was made so easy with the use of the Vintaj Patina Inks Weathered Copper, giving wonderful coverage. A little ageing was needed so StazOn timber brown and Alcohol Inks ginger and rust came to the rescue. This piece has pride of place in my craft room.

 

Ashli didn't have much of a plan when she started playing with Jolee's French General Metal Ribbons, but she ended up with a mini mirror home decor piece that is so very French inspired!

I must admit, this week's challenge had me a bit stumped at first. The only experience I have with anything French is almost failing my required language course in grade school. But, as soon as I saw Jolee's French General Metal Ribbons, I knew they would jump start my inspiration. With the banners by my side, I grabbed my stencils, alcohol inks, mists, and Stickles in coordinating colors and went to town on my canvas. Then, with the sweet little girl chipboard piece from Crate Paper and a re-purposed mirror, this home decor piece for my three daughters came together. When they glance in the mirror, they will remember... "Tu Es Jolie." You Are Beautiful!

Terry made a French Decoration Frame and had lots of fun by making it.

When I heard of the French Challenge Theme I immediately thought of a small frame that I wanted to alter. When I think of French I think of the Papillon Stampset of Tim Holtz, the background was made with lots of French words and sprayed on with Glimmermist. I worked on the butterflies with Embossing powder and Utee. The frame was worked on with Tissue Tape and on top I played with Distress Stains such as Walnut Stain and Fired Brick and yep some Crackle. And to finish my French piece I placed the Tim Holtz corners and the Wendy Wings.

Sandra Mouwen adores Paris. She has a great love for the Eiffel tower.

I went to Paris two months ago and I've had the best time there. A trip to Paris isn't a real Paris trip unless you've been to the Eiffel tower. A big wish of mine is to climb it one day! For my Paris inspired piece, I made a little canvas and covered it with a napkin I picked up on another trip. I used lots of Glue n' Seal to adhere it down. I surrounded myself with lots of texture stamps and began stamping with KaiserCraft Script, KaiserCraft Numbers and the dots from Bitty Grunge. I also used lots of Paint Dabbers along the way. The Parisian lady I draw/painted is inspired by Christy Tomlinsons art. I really like her style!

When Candy thinks of France, she thinks of shabby chic, the Eiffel Tower, Moulin Rouge and can can girls.  That was her inspiration for creating this tres chic matchbox dresser.

I took French in high school but was more years ago than I care to remember.  However, I have always loved French things; their art, their historic landmarks, their food and their shabby chic style.  That inspired me to create this very shabby chic dresser using 10 small matchboxes.  The dresser is covered in those beautiful papers from Prima's Almanac 6x6 paper pad. The "CHIC" bunting was created from Tim Holtz' Mini Scallops On The Edge die cut and covered in Rock Candy Stickles for that extra vintage feeling.  Every side of the chest is embellished with French goodness, including a Tim Holtz Paris Collage scene embossed with Black and Copper Embossing Powders.

 

Trace  has always had wonderful French speaking girlfriends....Bonjour!!

Living in the bilingual country of Canada, I have had the honor of having many French speaking girlfriends throughout my life. I was inspired by them to make this France inspired manila tag. When I think of France I think of Regal, so I knew that aged mahogany, fired brick, wild honey, and dusty concord would be the perfect Tim Holtz Distress Stains to use when colouring in the Tim Holtz Papillon stamped and embossed image...they are also one of my friends favorite colours...Perfect! I can't wait to give it to her!

 

 

I (May) was inspired to use some of my French General goodies as I sat down to decorate this little notebook.

I am in need of a good holiday notebook, and I wanted to use this challenge to use some of the French General goodies in my stash as well. Using some product packaging as a base on my cover, as well as the Tim Holtz papillon stamp as well, my 'inspiration francaise' came together in no time! Now I have a spot for noel notes, and isn't it tres chic?

 

 

Suzz decided to create her own Eiffel Tower using her version of tiles:

I have always been fascinated with the Eiffel Tower and the beautiful architecture.  I decided to create my own mini tiles by stamping on poster board.  The tiles use a variety of images from the Stampendous Charm Collection , Artistic Outpost - Paris Exposition,  Stampers Anonymous - Attic Treasures and Hero Arts - Rectangle Doily.  I tried several combinations of tiles shapes to form my tower.  I had to get approval from my in-house architects.   I attached the tiles to a background of layered tissue paper and corrugated cardboard. This project was quickly snatched up by my youngest daughter and is hanging in her room.  High praise indeed!

Anna-Karin made a French inspired tag, and you can almost smell the lavender when you look at it:

I spent a few nights in France long ago while camping with my family, and one of my memories from that trip is the many lavender plants that we saw. For my tag, I made lavender flowers with Flower Soft and florist wires. The background is stamped with Stamper’s Anonymous Tim Holtz French Market Place and Moulin Rouge stamps, and inked with red and purple shades of Distress Ink. A little tag, Eiffel Tower stamp, hanger clip, dyed crinkle ribbon and banner gave the last touches to the tag.

 

Dan took advantage of Tim Holtz's french "Cirque" stamp to revisit one of the recurring themes in his work, notions of identity and disguise.

Those of you who are familiar with my blog will know that I occasionally play around with ideas of  masks and hidden identities.  The Mona Lisa, already a figure surround by mystery, was my starting point.  I used the Mona from Tim Holtz's Artistic Collages stamp set and accented it with images from the I See Paris and The Big Top sets.  The ghosted postal frank mark was created using the Versamark resist technique and there's a little piece of Tattered Time cardstock in there somewhere.

I encourage you to check out each of the design team member's blogs for more photos, supply lists, and more. Simply click on their name (above the photo of their project) to visit their blog.

Now that we've shared the team creations - we're ready to see yours! As always, Simon Says Stamp is giving away a $50 gift voucher that will go to a random entry chosen by Random Generator. The challenge will close at 11:59pm Eastern time on Sunday, November 11th and the winner will be announced during the following week. To qualify all you need to do is create a new project that ties in (in any way!) with our theme and post it, along with a link back to this challenge, and add a link here.

For the full rules, read the "challenge rules" posted in the side-bar here on our blog.