#Decoupage papers

[borninwinter81]

Collage box collection

After discovering that I had a reasonably big stash of interesting flyers, greetings cards, guidebooks and other bits of ephemera, and seeing this tutorial, I was really inspired to use it all for something.

This was helped by the fact that recently I've found a lot of really nice wooden boxes in charity shops for very cheap - all the ones pictured here were £2. Either I've been extremely lucky, or these things turn up very often and I just haven't been looking for them.

I've posted about some of these previously (here and here), but they were only half done and these pictures are better! Plus there is one new one.

First was this wooden chocolate box. Before...

And after!

You can tell this is my first one as I oversatured the paper with Mod Podge, leading to it bubbling and creasing, but for a first attempt I don't think it's bad at all.

All the pictures I used were taken from an exhibition guide for an event I went to called "Exploring the Gothic" which contained a lot of beautiful pictures. The floral parts were from a pad of scrapbooking paper, which I also used to make the individual compartments (they are origami boxes, see a tutorial for how to make them here) and I then filled them with pieces from my collection of beads, charms, and broken jewellery.

I also had a guide to a William Blake exhibition I'd been to, and since there was an entire plate from "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" I had to make it into a miniature wall plaque.

I did this one at the same time as the first, and again you can kind of see that I oversatured the paper which caused it to tear slightly, however thankfully it wasn't in an area where there was any writing.

(BTW, if anyone is interested in the meaning of this section, Blake is describing his creative process, albeit in a fantastical way. This blog post gives a good analysis)

The next one was a beautiful little cabinet with a broken handle.

And here is what I did with it. I kept the collaging to a minimum, only on the inside, though I might add something to the outside in the future. The replacement "handles" are a pair of my earrings!

I used some more of the gothic exhibition guide and scrapbook paper, and also a flyer for a ballet version of Dracula. I need to find some more interesting things to fill it as it currently only contains my resin crow's skull and a miniature book of Tennyson poems. Also my Cthulhu candle gets to sit on top and be worshipped by the skeleton on the right door.

I did much better with the collaging process on this one. I was a lot more patient, used less Mod Podge for each layer and allowed them to dry fully in between, resulting in no tears, bubbles or creasing.

The final and most recent is this plain box. I noticed it originally came from somewhere called "Palmyra Hardware" which instantly made me think of the Palmyra Wolves (I'm a fan of MrBallen and saw him tell the story on his YouTube channel) which gives a pleasantly creepy angle to this one before I even did anything to it!

After collaging

The central image on the outside is another William Blake painting, an illustration to Dante's Inferno, which includes the famous quote "Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here". The writing saying "The way, the truth, the life" came from a religious leaflet that a friend of mine was forcibly given, and which he ripped to shreds, but I saved this part because for some reason I liked it.

Inside we've got a very famous Blake painting called "The Ancient of Days", the praying skeleton again as this image was reproduced several times in that guidebook, and a block printed demon from a handmade birthday card that a friend gave me several years ago. I'm very pleased to have finally been able to use him for something!

I've enjoyed making all of these immensely and no doubt I will do more in the future as I collect more papers and find more nice boxes 😊

[creepyscritches]

Since I stopped regularly posting my art online it's nuts the psyche reset my art brain went through. Ego death of whatever deviantart mentality. I'm back to drawing w markers bc it's fun, baby. Making my weird little things and breaking crafts bc it's not always an unusable result lol. Waiting to get back to my 12yr old mary sue generator brain, it's the next step to making more things I enjoy making

[u-mspcoll]

A découpage piece by Şehrî in Isl. Ms. 438

Calligraphic découpage / cut-work piece in nastaʻlīq (talik) signed by the calligrapher, Şehrî (Fol.22a in Isl. Ms. 438, Islamic Manuscripts Collection)

Enjoy this post from Sumeyra Dursun, 2023 Heid Fellow, drawn from her research in the Islamic Manuscripts Collection. Sumeyra is a doctoral candidate in the history of Islamic arts at Yildiz Technical University in Istanbul.

[eppujensen]

Beautiful papier mache teacups decoupaged with paper napkins! Tutorial by Claire Armstrong at Pillar Box Blue.

[coffeenuts]

[thelittlepapers]

"Pandore" (20x29) - Papier, colle & acrylique Série "les Sorcières"

[mybrainproblems]

Hey Alex what did you do with your first week of vacation?

I also put together an armchair from IKEA! And picked out paint colors and wallpaper for when I take on that project in a couple months!

I don't have a before pic of the coffee table but it was plain wood with a finish similar to the cabinet

[ezekiellsplayground]

Completed lighthouse paper tole.

There is lots of wiring and extra supports to achieve the shapes and layering without excessive silicone use. The lighthouse has plastic behind the lens windows & the railing is constructed from animal whisker fibres.

I wasn’t sure how well a photo would illustrate the nature of a paper tole work, so I hope the video better shows the visual impact of this style of decoupage.

[borninwinter81]

Collage curio cabinet

Another day, another awesome find! This miniature curio cabinet was £2. Part of the reason it was so cheap is probably because one of the handles is slightly broken (just missing the hanging part) but it's still perfectly usable.

Though I did think the paint job was quite pretty, it's not my style, so a repaint was in order. I used what I had to hand which was cheap black acrylic paint. Not ideal for furniture perhaps, but I'm happy enough with it. Also because I was lazy and didn't remove the old paint the doors are now very tight fitting and I can't close them properly. It's easy to fix, I can sand the top and bottom of each door down to the wood and then repaint them, but honestly I don't mind too much, and I can always do this in the future if not being able to close it gets on my nerves.

If the inside had been as red as its appearing in this pic I probably would have kept it like that, but the lighting must have been weird as it's exactly the same orange that you see in the first pic.

Any little charm or dangle would be good to replace the broken handle - I had this fake pearl teardrop in my collection from an old charm bracelet. I absolutely love how it looks, and it's actually way easier to grab hold of than the other handle, however unfortunately I've only got one of these pearl droplets so I can't remove the other handle to make them match just yet. This kind of thing pops up all the time in charity shops though, I'm sure I can find another charm bracelet or even better a pair of earrings that I could use.

The ring I've used to connect it is a hinged body piercing ring which I ordered online but was too small for me to comfortably wear, and I have a few so can use another when I need to.

I have a huge stack of scrapbooking paper from another similar project I did recently, so I cut two pieces of that using my paper guillotine to glue into the back.

I also have tons of interesting bits of paper and art left from that same project which I wanted to see if I could use. This is a 100% perfect spot for one of the anatomical drawings I have, as it looks like he's praying to the cthulhu candle I've put on top! (Paint inside still slightly wet here, i was impatiently trying bits out!)

This is what I came up with for the other door (another anatomy drawing and a flyer from a ballet version of Dracula)

I haven't yet decided what to do on the front of the doors. There's nothing in my collection of paper pieces that's really speaking to me right now. I think it would look really cool with some metallic bits stuck to the front but again, nothing in my collection that I like enough to glue on there, so I'm going to leave it as is for now and will add more in the future if/when I find some pieces that work. Here's how it looks for now after using mod podge on the doors and the back, though I think I'm probably going to go over the whole cupboard to help seal the paint. Apologies for terrible lighting.

Bonus piece: amongst my bits of paper I had a guide from a William Blake exhibition which contained this reproduction of one of the plates from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. I really wanted to use it, but Blake is so important to me and the picture so perfect that I thought it warranted special treatment. Instead of using it in a collage with other pieces, I painted a small piece of board from a broken picture frame and stuck it to that, and made a little triangle out of some jewellery wire so I can hang it on my wall. It's extremely lightweight so although this is only taped down it shouldn't come unstuck.

[storiesbetween]

decoupaged a notebook for my next WIP 👍🏻

[livingbewitchingly]

(via The Art of Decoupage)

[eppujensen]

Very pretty upcycled tin cans made into wind chimes with paint and paper napkin decoupage. By Patti at Hearth and Vine. Once you get the cans cleaned, this should be an easy and quick project.

[theguest2]

my waking hell

[artisticdivasworld]

Cardboard Really is Versatile for Crafting

It seems that every time I turn around, I am getting something in a cardboard box. This could create a huge pile of mess; however, I have recently discovered the joy of crafting with cardboard. Now I see that stack of flattened boxes as a medium for crafts and art. I love that I can keep most of these boxes out of the landfill and turn them into reused articles so they get a new life. That, to…

[fedorahead]

seeking advice

today we were showered with a flurry of words, as if sprinkled by an oracle onto the dirty carpet. i did not divine their meaning before returning them to their storage.

does anyone know how to store scraps of magazine paper without them edging their way out of the box?

i have envelopes for specific projects (like jenna ortable) but i've lost those 😅 and even envelopes don't really hold them all in

any boxes/storage containers that have worked for you or might work for me? right now i'm using a sterilite tupperware thing and an old candy box

[ezekiellsplayground]

Completed tree frog paper tole. Time taken was 4 sittings of about 3-4 hours each.