Spotlight on Art: Stamp and Fold

I just love sharing artwork with you, my loyal blog readers. Every week I am just so excited to see what you will think of the latest artwork to come out of the Art Studio here; just as excited as I am to see what they will come up with next! This week’s technique takes stamping to whole new level – or should I say, dimension?

There are lots of things I love about this page: the darling photograph, the fun Flirty colors, the wood grain textured paper from Dakota, and that Honey border, which showcases a neat technique. The artist started with some tone-on-tone stamping, using Honey ink to stamp a pattern from the Paisley Flair stamp set on Honey cardstock circles. Using tone-on-tone stamping is a nice way to add texture and depth without making the end result overly busy.

But she didn’t stop there, she then folded in the edges of the circles and lined them up together to add a fun pop to this border. With uniform folding, the circles look like they are overlapping and woven together.

This card has a lot going for it as well: a fun paper-pieced elephant, some expert stitching, and, yep, dimensional stamping again. This time our artist stamped the large image from the Pirouette stamp set on a narrow strip of Flirty Raspberry cardstock to give it a patterned look. She then folded the cardstock strip to look like a pleated ribbon before attaching it to the card. The end result is a dimensional faux-ribbon that she made with just Cardstock and stamps!

This is another card that gives another way folding and stamping can add dimension to your projects. It started with several hearts cut out of White Daisy cardstock as well as Flirty Raspberry, Honey, Cotton Candy and Buttercup cardstocks. On the White Daisy hearts, the artist stamped patterned images from the Buttons, Bits and Bobs stamp set as well as the rugged Dude stamp set. She matched her inks to the cardstocks, pairing Gypsy ink with the Flirty Raspberry cardstock, and then scored them down the center, layered, and stitched them to her card front. She gently folded the edges of the cards out to heighten the dimensional effect.

In this final example, the artist used the same technique to accomplish a mosaic of dimension on the cover of a My Creations canvas journal. Again, she started with tone-on-tone stamping to stamp the background images from the Universal Background stamp set onto Cardstock squares. She then trimmed the squares into 1/2” squares, scored them diagonally and folded up one corner of each square before adhering them to the notebook.

What crafting projects are you working on right now that could use a little extra dimension? Look for ways to add stamped and folded elements for a 3-D effect that will pop right off your projects.