Art Journaling Doilies
I haven’t ever been brilliant with watercolors but I have grown to like them very much. Recently I have used them more and more in art journaling. On this page I have used just watercolors, color pencils and markers.
This page tells a story and that’s something I want to increase too: add more text and content to my pages. Here I write about how as a small child I wanted to learn how to crochet. I thought it is a part of good parenting to teach the child to crochet as young as possible! As soon as I learned it I was crocheting like crazy: doll clothes, doilies, clothes, valence curtains … I was the crocheting queen until I started dating and my boyfriend took me to see his family’s summer cottage.
All the textiles in that log cabin were crocheted! Full-sized curtains, bed covers, cushions, table cloths, you name it! His grandmother had done all that. I was speachless. When I met her she told me that a doctor had told her not to crochet anymore as her hands hurt. But as she wanted to do something she had started to learn printing fabric.
The relationship with the boy did not last and the grandmother must have been passed away already but now I know that you do not need to hold the hook to crochet. You can use your pen!
Using Hand Decorated Papers in Scrapbook Pages
“The golden door is open” says this page. I feel like I have entered the new level of scrapbooking when I have increased the amount of handmade elements, especially hand decorated papers.
I wonder why store-bought papers are so popular. Using my own papers is so inspiring. Here’s “Empty Scenes”.
In this page I have used odd leftover letter stickers to create patterned background area in the bottom of the page. Did not cost anything but with some gesso and acrylics they got a new look.
With hand decorated papers I have begun to pick themes that I never did before. Like this one about Sibelius’s Finlandia hymn, my aunt and being a Finn.
The Second Quilt for Stella
In the post from May I wrote about modern quilting and showed a quilt that I had made for my new puppy Stella. Even if I have not written a lot about quilting, I have spent quite a lot of time browsing modern quilt blogs and even sewing a little. Now I have finally something to show, it’s a new quilt for Stella, a modern quilt that also has some ribbons and lace.
I am so pleased with this. First, I love the colors. Second, it was a good choice to use double wadding to make the quilting more visible. Third, I think I was able to incorporate laces and ribbons in a creative way. Fourth, I so enjoyed the process of making this! I did not use a lot of time for planning. I had a vision of expressing vintage childhood and vintage linens and it lead the way.
This is a little detail that I love the most: I hand embroidered Stella’s name to a small antique lace square!
And she loves the quilt, of course!
From Art Journaling To Fabric Design
This time I want to show how I use my art to make designs. Some may think that art journaling and art in general is very far way from design. But that’s not true. You can grab inspiration and ideas from art and it can be very straight forward.
Remember the art journal page I made about women loving historical dramas? It grabbed my attention while I was searching for ideas for a new fabric design. See the yellow-orange ornament on the right corner? I liked the way it was structured.
So I redraw it and tried how it would work as a repeat.
After that I opened Adobe Illustrator and created a digital version of it. I do not usually scan my doodles even if you can do so. I like to understand the structure of the ornament first and then fine-tune it while re-creating it.
Another thing that I like to do is to leave some asymmetry to the motif. I think it looks more interesting that way.
When choosing colors I decided to imitate the contrasts in the art journaling page. I created two colour combinations and three sizes for test prints.
This is how they came out! See my Etsy store for more photos!
When art journaling I am often filled with ideas and details. I have found out that it is not a good thing for me to try to control the creative flow then. To design is to simplify. Later one image can offer jumpstart to many designs. I still see many details on this page that I could use for designs.
An art journal can be your mini world, the best sourcebook for any pattern design!