Trust Your Heart

This  month DIY Design Studio is bringing you "Art from the Heart" and we encourage you to join us. 

Tag us on social media and show us what you create with #DIYartfromtheheart.  

Come along with me on my very first project of 2019!

I have created a mixed media piece by upcycling a heart shaped chocolate candy box that I saved from Valentine's Day 2018.  To create this I used cardboard pieces, gesso, acrylic paints, Gelatos, misc. inks,  chipboard as well as lace and other embellishments. 

Here was the process.  

 I applied gesso to the box, then added torn cardboard using Aleene's Tacky Glue. 

Another layer of gesso was added so there was a primed surface for everything else to adhere to.  Not necessary, but I just tend to gesso most surfaces. 

 Next, came a layer of pink and white acrylic paints. 

Next, I dry fit papers, die cuts and vintage Rolodex cards for a textural base. 

Lace was added and painted paper hearts were attached with mini clothes pins, paper flowers and more painted card board pieces were glued down. 

I also added a little text sentinment for a title.  I just printed this on my computer and outlined it using my micron pen and adhered it with Tacky Glue. 

You can better see the paper flowers I used in the pic below.  These specifically came in white and I added the same pink ink to the centers that I used to colorize my background of the entire piece (you can see the drippy ink elements in the 2 photos above).  I also dry brushed a bit of black acrylic paint to the edges of the petals.  You can NEVER have too many layers of color.  The Little Birdy paper flowers are very pretty on their own, but colorizing them to 100% match the other elements ties the whole look together.  

The final element was diluting white acrylic paint and adding white splatter marks to the entire project.  Okay, that gets everywhere so be aware of that before you go flinging watered down paint on your work of art. You will find white little dots for days.  But, hey that is all part of the fun!  Get a little inky and painty...it is good for your soul!  Oh, a fan brush works best for splatter...well that or running your finger along a toothbrush drenched in watered down paint.  WHAT FUN!!! 

I hope you enjoyed this project.  

I hope your New Year is off to an amazing start.  

I also hope you are inspired to make Art from YOUR Heart.   Stay tuned for more inspiration from the DIY Design Team!

Be sure to check DIY Design Studio for all of your 

craft, vintage and painting supply needs!

Happy Friday! 

~Stephanie

Spooky is My Favorite Color of Fall!

Hopefully by now you have seen a few projects from us here at DIYDesignStudio relating to our favorite colors of Fall.  Well, my favorite color is anything SPOOKY.  I am a total Halloween junky.  If you have followed me for a while you already know that.  I am keeping the spooky flavor going with this project as well and created a Book of Spells.  I love making a new one every year to add to my collection of DIY spell and potion books. 
So, let me show you my process...
Get your vintage book from DIY Design Studio to being your upcycle.  Paint it black.  Mine is a huge law book.  It is 11 x 8.5 and almost 4 inches thick!  Nice big book, you know...to hold all my spells and potions.  

Next, grab the versatile Prima Relics & Artifacts skulls and angles resin blanks and give them a gothic paint job.  Then, adhere them to your book cover (I used hot glue) and add a thick layer of gesso over the entire book surface.  Leave a lot of texture in your gesso.  

I had a mini frame in my stash that was silver so I gave it a black wash, then a bit of dry brushed gold paint and added vintage text.  I then glued my Relics skull to the center of the frame (again hot glue) and added that to the book cover.  The skull got the same gothic paint job prior to attaching to the frame. 

   

I then hot glued florals to the surface.  And then, gave them a wash of watered down, very fluid black acrylic pain. 

(look at all that demension)

 

I added a bunch of washi tape here and there...that is the black and white script you see.  I also painted the word "Spells" in gold metalic acrylic paint.  I love this Prima Alchemy paint line.  I could just put that stuff on everything. 

 

And, there you go...a DIY Spell Book.  I recommend you make a bunch.  They look great all grouped together.  In another week or so all of my Halloween decor will finally come out of the garage and I will display the spell books together.  I CAN'T WAIT!!! 

Thanks so very much for joining me today. 

I hope you were inspired to make a 

spooky little something for yourself.

DIY Design Studio has everything you need to do just that.

Have a GREAT weekend!

Steph