Decorative Scrap Papermaking + tut

After spending a delightful afternoon with handmade shop paper making decorative hearts it seemed a pity to waste the scraps that lay on the floor and the table. I'd been doing fabric mache the other day and decided to make use of the paper offcuts by reworking them into a totally new surface.

As well as plant, wrapping and leaf paper I'd been using an old book rescued from Swapshop, a bio of Madame Pompadour parts of which had beautiful itallic script in french that made a beautiful contrast with the subtle cream and browns of the plant paper from Arcadia.

Step 1: lots of paper scraps, glue, water , cartridge paper and an old paintbrush

Step 1: Start off with a water/glue mix of 70/30%. Paint a sheet of cartridge paper and start to lay the offcuts and torn pieces of paper onto the surface.
Step 2: Gradually build up 3 different surfaces of stripes and text,stripes, text and cutout hearts and a mix of coloured, decorated surfaces with text.*



Step 3: Finish off with final paint over of the glue mix and leave them to dry.


Step 4: Once dry they can be cut out into shapes to make more hearts, stitched over by the machine to make mixed media art, added to fabric to make an art quilt, back with fresh card and used as gift tags................... its really quite endless


* You can also use threads, stamps, any kind of paper ephemera to build up your surface. Different types of text can be exciting next to plain prints

Mixed Media Lavender Dolls

These lovely little dolls were inspired by some enchantic paper little doll pendents in Belle Armoir.
Originally they were simply going to be art dolls small enough to go on a dressing table or to decorate a mantle but my original sketches turned out so sweetly I thought it was a shame for them to be simply decorative.
I know you can buy expensive, scented washing treatments but they tend to involve chemicals and frankly unless you want to waft around smelling of the unlikely combination of tropical plants and semi precious stones you're left with fresh air and chamomile which, nice as it is can become a little insipid. I'd been gifted with a load of dried lavender so I popped a couple of teaspoons into the lambswool stuffing so these enchanting little ladies can now be popped in your lingerie drawer to give you sweet scented linens and lace.

That is of course if you can bring yourself to shut them away out of sight.