Guest Designer Mabel Sims!

Saturday, March 14, 2015

We are so excited to share this week's guest designer with you! Mabel Sims is extremely talented and does an incredible job of using Mixed Media elements in all of her projects! She is sharing a tutorial with us today that you will not want to miss! Sit back, have a cup of coffee and enjoy! Be sure to leave Mabel some blog love!



Hi Guys!

I'm so honoured to be invited on this fabulous team at Frosted Designs as a Guest Designer. This is my first ever designer post so I'm super excited!

A little description about myself: I'm living in Singapore, a tiny island/country in South East Asia with a climate that is very much predictable, that is HOT HOT HOT 24/7. Hahah. I first started out scrapbooking a couple of years back, only focusing on making cards. It's only about a year ago I ventured into making layouts and I'm currently heads over heals in love with it. I would say my style is very mixed media as I love how versatile these mediums are, I could make a mistake and rectify it almost immediately, that's how forgiving they are. They are also somewhat unpredictable (in a good way!), be sure to be surprise when you create with mediums! If you're currently not into mixed media, I strongly urge y'all to try it. It's really not that terrifying as what people originally thought. My blog focus mainly on step-by-step tutorials. You can find my blog HERE!

Now, I'm going to show you a tutorial on how I made my little 6x6 inches canvas piece meant for home decor. 

I first started out with priming my canvas with heavy white gesso by Prima Finnabair. I then sprayed randomly all over the canvas (Don't think too much! Just do it!) using Heidi Swapp's Gold mist, Tim Holtz Distress Spray in Tattered Rose and in Shabby Shutters. After everything dried, I pulled out my new flourish stencil from Tim Holtz and applied a thick coat of White Sand Texture Paste from Prima Finnabair. 

I have to say this texture paste has got pretty interesting texture after dried. It dries shiny and rough. It's actually very nice to touch. As you can see from the picture, I lightly brush on some gesso to make the flourish stand out better. It sort of created a white-wash effect which was matching to the background, giving off that very antique/vintage-looking vibe.


I also brushed on a light coat of Ranger's Clear Crackle and made it more visible by watercoloring Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Brushed Corduroy. 


With a new shade of dark brown, I think it made the background stand out even more as there's now a mixture of different shades of browns and greens. 


Now that the background is done, I need to think of what to embellish it.

I gave myself a challenge to use some of the stuff that was long forgotten. Haha. Such as this Tattered  Floral Bigz die from Sizzix. I actually bought it LONG LONG LONG ago but didn't use it at all. So I cut out a couple of the same sizes and layered them up. Glued down a matching button in the centre and altered the flower with Tim Holtz Distress ink in Brushed Corduroy.


This is the final look of the canvas!

As you can see, I die cut some leaves from the Prima leaves dies for layering. I also managed to dug out a long forgotten border punch and punched a strip and glued it down vertically. Most of the flowers I used were from Prima and I also added some mica fragments in Tea Stained colour from Stampendous. I loved how the dark colour of the mica fragments increased the interest of the canvas as the rest of the colours were pretty soft. The sentiment was actually a cut out from Kaisercraft's patterned paper. I also painted a light coat of gesso on the outer petals of the flowers to give some highlights. It also had the effect of pulling everything together. 


Here are some close-ups shots. 




I enjoyed the process of making this canvas. The colour scheme is actually pretty challenging for me as I never thought green and light pink (that's the original colours of the sprays, but everything became brownish after they dried on canvas. Told you mediums can be unpredictable! Hahah) would go well together and this is my first time succeeding in creating a vintage layout. My previous attempts didn't work out as my style of embellishing stuff is not vintage at all so I'm super happy that I can finally strike the 'vintage' theme off my to-do list as well as using those long forgotten products. Haha. 

So...That's all for today. 

I hope you like my post and also feel inspired to try out mixed media if you haven't. 
Do check out my blog at www.mabsdesigns.blogspot.com for more inspiration. 

Cheers! :)

Mabel






12 Comments »

12 Responses to “Guest Designer Mabel Sims! ”

mikosspot.blogspot.com said...

Awesome awesome tutorial

Julie Tucker-Wolek said...

Absolutely STUNNING!! WOW WOW WOW!!!!!

Suzanne cricutcraftingrammyblogspot.com said...

This is gorgeous. Thanks for a wonderful tutorial on what you did.

Rachelle Olaridge said...

What a gorgeous design. Fabulous details and colors Love it!
Huggies!!!!

Raechelle Bellus said...

This is absolutely stunning!!!! Thanks so much for sharing your gorgeous project and talent with us!

Cherished said...

Beautiful Canvas. I love all the texture and details.

Byrd Street Studio said...

Love these colors and all the textures.Awesome finished piece.

C.Lam. said...

Oh what a stunning project@!!!! Loved it!!!! Thank you so much for the inspiration! !!!

Unknown said...

Love the step by step tutorial for this beautiful canvas! Such beautiful texture and design.

Barb Craft said...

Wow Mabel! This is fabulous!! I love all of the details and that you gave us a tutorial so we can try this ourself! Thank you for joining the Frosted Designs Team today!

ElizabethR said...

Wow I love that it's fabulous, great tutorial. Elizabeth xxx

Katy said...

GORGEOUS!!! LOVE all the texture and layers! Thanks for being a Guest DT Member and sharing your talent with us!