Hello dear readers!
It's Alexandra here today with our usual Tutorial Thursday section.
I want to show you how to create a shadow box wall hanging as well as embellish it with versatile die-cuts from La-La Land Crafts.
Let's begin!!!
To tell you the truth, I have a circle cutter (both by
Martha Stewart and by
EK Success), but
after throwing several sheets of cardstock away without getting one even
circle, I decided to use an “oldie but goodie”
pair of
compasses. :)
So, in any way which is comfortable for you, prepare 3 circles of the 6” diameter and 1 template of the same
diameter (I used a regular printing paper for that).
Take the template piece and fold it in half, then turn 90
degrees clockwise and fold again:
This is how we can easily find the center of the circle.
Take a needle tool and poke a hole in the middle, where the folded lines meet:
Take one of the 3 circles and place the template piece on top, try to match two
of the circles as precise as possible (this shouldn’t be really hard, though we
are talking about the same diameter circles here) J Pole the hole again, to
“transfer” it to the bottom circle.
Take a pair of compasses, and using a ruler measure 2
1/4". Draw a circle of this radius on one of the 6” circles. Cut it out to
get a “ring”:
So, now we have two 6” circles and one “ring”:
Cut s stripes of paper measuring 1” X 12”. Score 1/4” from both sides of each stripe:
Cut the snips of about ¼” on both of the scored sides (on the
3 stripes):
Take one of the circles and embellish to your taste. I’ve
stamped the edge and distressed it with the Vintage Photo Ink:
To this circle we will add two eyelets and a thread, so that
we will be able to hang our shadow box on a wall. So… Mark the places where the
eyelets will be, and punch holes of the corresponding size (matching the size
of the eyelets). Pull one end of the thread through the hole and leave a “tale”
of about 1”. The thread I took was about 8” long, but again, everything depends
on how long you want your thread to be.
Holding the tale from the back side, place an eyelet from
the front to secure the thread at its place:
This is how it should look like from the back side before
you’ve set the eyelet:
And after you’ve set it:
Repeat the process for the second eyelet:
Secure the tales with the clear tape:
Take another circle and glue it down to the one with the
eyelets (on the side where the tales are):
Back to the “ring” piece. Stamp it and distress (or embellish
with the designer paper) according to your taste:
Take one of the strips, fold the snipped parts and curve the
strip with your fingers in the following way:
We will attach this strip to the inside part of the ring and
this way will start to form our shadow box. Apply the blue bit by bit, and glue
the strip down, paying attention to the edges, try to keep them as round as
possible.
** I use a
quick dry adhesive by Scotch, but I
suppose you can use any other glue you like to work with, just be patient and
don’t hurry with this step.
When the strip will be about to end, take another strip and
glue the edge of it to the first one:
Finish forming the inside part of the shadow box, and cut
the access of the second strip (don’t throw it away though). This is how things
should look like by now:
Now, using your fingers shape and curve the third strip and the left piece
of the second one in the following manner:
Start gluing the strips to the outer edge of the shadow box
in the same way you did for the inside edge – bit by bit.
Cut off the access:
This is how it will look like after you’re done both with
the outer and the inside edge:
Apply the adhesive on the folded snips as follows:
Now attach this piece to the circle with the eyelets and the
thread. Take your time!! Although the adhesive is quick-dry, you’ll have enough
time to straighten everything up while
paying attention to the edge. Make it as
perfect as you can J
Now comes the fun part – embellishing! Die cut the cogs of
different colors using the various La-La Land Crafts dies. I’ve cut out a Steampunk
Clock as well:
Since the clock is quite delicate, I’ve backed it up with an
acetate sheet using Glossy Accents:
Start to place the cogs inside the shadow box (without
gluing them down yet), have a look at your project, arrange the cogs the way
you like and only after that start to glue them down.
*I’ve doubled the most of the cogs with plain white
cardstock.
The first layer of cogs that you see here are glued down
with the simple glue:
And those on top, are
glued with the tiny pieces of mounting tape for achieving a 3D effect:
Continue adding the rest of the die-cut shapes and form your
design:
I’ve added several wooden cogs and brads’ heads here and
there:
And here are the pictures of my finished wall-hanging:
You can download my computer generated sentiment in PNG
format here (Right Click to Save As..)
The La-La Land Dies used for creating this shadow box are as
follows:
Thanks for viewing and have fun creating!
Hugs,
Alexandra
