Creating your own backgrounds....part 1

For the current issue of Scrapbook Magazine I was asked to create 5 layouts showing different ways of creating your own backgrounds. Now I am not the most adventurous scrapper when it comes to being messy on my pages but it was great fun experimenting to create the pages and I realised that using "messy" techniques can be quite controlled and clean!
On my first page I used burlap for the background and added some paint around my central design, I frayed the edges of the fabric and the stitched around it. To make the page more sturdy I trimmed down a piece of cardstock and secured it by adding, wavy, line around the edge of the page.

When Hannah over at Handmade Hannah sent me an order she had wrapped the stash up in tissue paper and a gorgeous ribbon, the day I received the parcel I was working on this page and the ribbon was just perfect to pleat across the page. Thank you Hannah!

For my second page I decided to used some gorgeous 7 gypsies tissue paper, this is quite expensive but you get a lot in a pack and it goes a long way. I coated a sheet of cardstock with gesso and carefully laid a piece of tissue paper on top whilst it was still wet. Then I simply smoothed out the tissue very gently, I didn't worry about the creases as I loved the texture that they added to the background. Once it was completely dry I trimmed the edges and added a line of stitching around the outside and matted it onto a piece of patterned paper.

I love the texture of the burlap and I saw yesterday that Tim Holtz has brought out some printed burlap sheets, they look great but are a bit pricey at nearly £14 each so I thought about trying to add some of the tissue paper onto the burlap and seeing if the texture is still evident, a much cheaper option. I will let you know if it works out!

I will be back with the other pages that I created in a few days time, there are full details of how each page was created in SBM including step by step photos.

TFL

xx