Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #23--Paper Holiday Decorations

Playbill Tree Topper

For Challenge #23 we were asked to use materials that we already have--to take something old and make it new. I have a collection of Playbills from most of the shows that come to our theater. The Playbill is the free program that is given out to all of the audience members. Many times, the Playbills get updated and become obsolete so I usually will snag a bundle or two to recycle. I am always looking for ways to repurpose these materials.

So for the current show, I decided to make a tree topper made from the cover of the Playbill. As you can see above, the show is prominently displaced in the center of the star.

Never to be satisfied with only one project, I decided to try and use the Playbills for other purposes. I made two paper bows with can feature any of the small pictures featured in the Playbill. Once uses the cover artwork and the other uses the black and white pages of the book's interior.

Playbill Bow (Cover)

Playbill Bow (Pages)

Finally, since I had so much material left over, I decided to try and miniaturize the tree topper star and make an ornament. The ornament below is made from two 2 inch squares of paper.

Playbill Star Ornament

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #22--Fall Flowers

Inspiration

This is going to be a bit of a strange post. For this challenge, we were tasked to create something dedicated to Fall colors. Orange has always been one of my favorite colors so I knew which direction I was headed. I love color and color theory and people are always asking me what inspires me and affects my color sense. After reading the posted challenge, I was walking by one of the Manhattan bodegas. In Manhattan, we always have flowers and foliage available for last minute gifts. As I was walking past, I noticed the above flower arrangement and decided to immediately do a floral arrangement for this challenge.

What many of you might not know is that I have always loved flowers. One of my only regrets about living in NYC is not being able to garden. I would love to have a plot of land to grow flowers for arrangements. If I had the chance to redo my life, I would have been a gardener and/or florist.

There were so many beautiful blooms available. I found these yellow and yellow/brown Calla Lilies.

Yellow Calla Lilies

There were also Dahlias in yellows, golds and oranges.

Dahlia

I fell in love with these Pumpkin Trees which I had never seen before. I found out that they were actually ornamental eggplants. Unfortunately, they were out-of-stock when I went back to the store.

Pumpkin Tree/Pumpkin on a stick

These Lantern Flowers have always intrigued me. They apparently intrigued everyone else because they were gone when I went back to buy them.

Chinese Lantern Flowers

And you can't have a Fall arrangement without berries and buds. I don't know this specific variety but they definitely fit the theme.

Berries & Buds

As I was deciding what to use for my arrangement, I decided on the Dahlias and Calla Lilies as my main flowers. For height, I added curly willow and cattails. I used lemon leaves, berries and some buds to fill out the arrangement.

Raw Materials

Below is the result. I am very happy with the result and gave it to a friend who needed some cheering up.

The Final Arrangement

I am always amazed at the overhead in flower arrangements. I really don't think that a simple arrangement like this is very difficult to do. If I had purchased this arrangement from a florist it would have been between $80 to $100. I already had the vase and the flowers totaled $25.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #21--Butterfly Mask--Part 2

A couple of people asked me to provide a pic of the Butterfly Mask in action. This is me at work guarding the Stage Door during broad daylight. To say that I caused a stir would be an understatement.  Since our show deals with Shakespeare we were asked to dressed as a character from a Shakespearean show or to dress as one of the characters from a musical referenced during the show.

I knew that most people would take the easy way out and dress as musical character. Oh no, not me. I chose to dress up as Oberon, King of the Faeries, from A Midsummer Night's Dream. In Victorian times, faeries where always represented by butterflies. Also, Oberon is a larger than life kind of character is usually tall and statuesque.

The costume is made from several pieces some of which were handmade, some purchased, and some from my stash. The leather corset and boots were from previous years' costumes. The skirt is made from an extra piece of tie dyed fabric from my stash. It is simply tied at the waist. I made the mesh tank top from material that I had around the apartment. It is a double layer of material with holes torn into both layers for effect. The butterflies were purchased and placed through the mesh tank top and through the laces of the corset.

By the end of the night, the only butterflies remaining were the ones in the mask. I gave the rest of them away before returning back stage.

I will have to say that many people stopped and took pictures and asked if they could pose with me. I worked this door for two hours before moving backstage.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #21--Butterfly Mask

For Challenge Number 21 were tasked with another color challenge--The Color black. I struggled with this challenge because I always work with the color black due of my cutouts. I also wanted to do something for Halloween. So, I decided to do a Masquerade Mask with cutouts.

For Halloween at the theater, we arecasked to dress up as a Shakespearean character (our current show features a Shakespeare references) so I decided to go as Oberon, King of the Fairies, from A Midsummer Night's Dream.

I started off with a white masquerade mask that can be purchased at any craft store during this time of year. I chose the mask that simply covers your nose and eyes (as opposed to the full face mask) and is affixed with an elastic band.

The first step was to pain the mask black with gesso. I applied two coats and then treated it with a blue mica powder to give it a sheen.

The second step was to apply the butterflies. I had these store bought butterflies that I was planning on using but the scale was too small. So I decided to make three butterfly cutouts. I would crease the butterfly down the center of the cutout to give dimension and then mount the store bought butterfly to the cutout. For the center of the mask, I took the third cutout and mounted rhinestones to give it some sparkle.

One side of the butterfly mask.

I will probably make another one of the these and put red and yellow rhinestones on the center butterfly. I will also cut the bottom part of the butterfly abdomen so that the wings have more motion and lie flat against the bridge of the nose.

The second side of the butterfly mask.

I am very happy with the way that it turned out (although the picture below doesn't seem like it).

Me modeling the mask*

* this is my "it's 2 AM and the Mets lost and I need to take a picture and go to bed" face.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #20--Scary Lampshade

For this challenge, we were asked to create something for Halloween. One of the actors at the theater is a big fan of Halloween so I decided to make something for his dressing room. Since another actor received the moose lampshade, I decided to decorate another lampshade.

This lampshade has two faces--an evil skill and a Keith Ledger Joker face. The faces are facing opposite directions so that both of the actors sharing the dressing room can each be facing an image. Or, the lampshade can be turned forward towards the door as people enter.

Evil Skull

Joker Face

The project turned out really well and everyone at the theater seems to enjoy it.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #19--Wee Pandas

For this challenge, we were allowed a do-over or a Mulligan. I had several projects in mind but I decided to combine several projects into one. Last challenge, I did Pandas. So I did Pandas again. Since these are cutouts, this also qualifies for the Paper Challenge. To add some interest and challenge to the challenge, I decided to re-visit the "Wee Challenge" or miniatures.

Each of the above images is 2" by 3". Although, you really can't tell, each one is attached to the back of my business card. I purposely didn't crop the image because all eight of the cutouts are attached to a single sheet of 8.5" by 11" piece of paper.

All of the images are from a Chinese Cutout Book by Dover. Some of them are more successful than others but I am very pleased with the results. I will say--working within these parameters was more difficult than I anticipated. This took me the full two weeks and there were many discarded attempts.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #18--Pandas

For Challenge #18, we were asked to be inspired by animals. With things getting busy with the upcoming holiday season, I needed to (1) either do a quick and easy project or (2) do something that I could combine with one of my other commitments. I chose the latter.

My dentist has been asking me for some artwork for this office. He just finished repainting and re-designing his work space and wanted some artwork. The walls are an tan/beige color and he needed something that was visually approachable to all of his clients.

When this challenge came along, I decided to do something to meet both needs. I had done a postcard based on pandas (the middle image) so I decided to revisit this artwork. The images are traditional Chinese Cutout Designs. I decided to do a triptych of pandas that will be mounted and framed in a single frame. I haven't quite decided how to mount them on paper and the matting color. I was thinking about putting the cutouts on green bamboo paper and then mounting them with fern green mat. The other thought would be to mount them on white paper and wrap the mat in the green bamboo paper. The frame will be a thin metallic dark green.

Yet Even More Wrapping Paper

It's a Boy

This time it was a baby shower for a friend from the theater. She is obviously having a boy and it is her first child. Guys weren't invited to the baby shower so I made my presence felt in other ways. Two of my friends were invited so I guaranteed that they presents would be remembered by everyone there.

Poodle Large

My friend has a toy poodle that has been her love and joy and we don't know how Dex (the poodle) is going to react to not being the center of attention. So we decided to make fun of the situation with this gift wrap. I did this in two formats--one for larger gifts and one for medium to smaller gifts.

Poodle Small

The paper was definitely the hit of the party.

Even More Wrapping Paper

Here is another in a series of wrapping paper that I made. This was made for one of the actors in the show at my theater. I found two Star Wars Commemorative mugs and decided to wrap them in handmade wrapping paper. The first design is a leaf and berry design. It is a basic stencil that is repeated three times across the sheet. 

When I work on these projects, I work on the stenciled image first and then work on the backgrounds. I usually like to offset negative and positive space. In the above paper, in the first and third group, I decided to concentrate on the positive space. To add a little interest, I colored the berries in different colors.  In the center group, I decided to highlight the negative space. The background is a red, white and blue plaid.

The second pattern uses a vine and leaf design. The stencil is the same for both sides. On the left side, I decided to highlight the positive space and doodled the leaves and colored the vines. The background is done in a Columbia blue in a pattern that I call lazy diamonds. It is accomplished by drawing horizontal lines and then diagonal lines. The right side of the paper highlights the negative space by filling in the background with horizontal lines. in complimentary green color.

Left side detail

Right side detail

More Wrapping Paper

I wanted to share with you some of the projects that I have been working on between the Iron Craft Challenges. I have been making a lot of handmade wrapping paper since August is always a busy month for birthdays and celebrations.

I am also developing a line of wrapping papers to sell through Spoonflower and I will share those designs a little bit later once the proof copies arrive and we settle some issues with the paper sources they are using.

These papers were simply designed on brown craft paper. For these, I used a stencil and then I doodled and detailed the background. These are all done by hand and are usually very appreciated by the recipients.

Pattern One

Pattern One is a collection of circles and onion dome shapes. Originally, I made an error when I repeated the pattern. Notice in the above picture, one of the circles has a line through it. It DROVE ME CRAZY. Someone told me that you learn more when correcting mistakes than when you originally design something. In the final wrap below, you can see that the solution was to bisect both the domes and the circles (in opposite directions)--an easy fix. I always forget to take pictures of the wrapped gift when I do these projects so I was pleased that I remembered to do so. Since this was for a teenage boy, I decided to use raffia instead of ribbon. This is a new type of raffia that is made from recycled plastic bags.

Final gift.

I called Pattern Two--Shoe Prints because that is what it looked like to me. I decided to use a pattern on pattern effect in that the shoes were vertical and horizontal lines and the background was a diagonal plaid.

Pattern Two

Pattern Three

Pattern Three was called Asteroids because I had a bunch of rough drawn circles emanating from a single source. The curved lines in the background were made with my new collection of large French curves. I have never seen plastic curves this size before and just happened across them at a new art supply store called DaVinci Artist Supply. I was visiting the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in Manhattan and ran across this store.

Wrapped Gifts

For these books, I decided to combine them and tie a burlap ribbon (although, I hate working with burlap--I am still itching from working with it). These books went to the twin brother of the Pattern One gift.

Many people ask me how I can concentrate and detail the backgrounds for these papers. It really is a Zen exercise for me. I usually plug into music, gather my guides, stencils, rulers and markers and just start. Before I know it, I am either (1) late for an appointment, (2) finished, or (3) have to stop to eat. And that ain't a bad way to spend some time alone.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #17--Felt Tip Markers

For this challenge, we where given the letter "F" as a guideline. I thought about a felting project. The catalyst for my project was my newly acquired Copic Markers sets. So I decided to play with them and decided that my F would be "felt tip markers."

I have been busily designing some new gift wrap options for my upcoming store on Spoonflower. I hope to release the designs within the next week. These are hand designed papers that you will be able to order directly from them. We hit a snag in that the matte paper they were using is being discontinued. There are some designs that I will be able to release in the interim but others will have to be placed on hold until the replacement paper is chosen.

Here is the basic Happy Birthday Wrapping Paper. The basic paper comes with the letters "pre-doodled" so all that you have to do is color in the letters and/or the background if you choose. This was done with Sharpie Markers.

Basic Happy Birthday Paper

Here is the paper colored in with Copic Markers. These markers are alcohol based markers so they blend easily together. I have chosen to leave the background blank on this sample.

Happy Birthday Reds

The second sample is a Thank You wrapping paper that has designed with a background and then reproduced. The background was done with Sharpie Markers. This is definitely fine on its own OR

Basic Thank You Paper

you can color in the words yourself. I used the Copic Markers for the words on this sample.

Thank you in Blues

I am still tweeking the designs and they will be available in my Spoonflower shop under nystarcards.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #16--Cabin Lampshade

Moose Scene

For Challenge #16, we were asked to contribute to the Minnesota State Fair. After much internal debate (not), I knew that I wanted to enter the Decorative Crafts Division--Paper Cutting competition. Somehow, my eyes immediately locked to that entry in the official rules and divisions.

The only difficulty was deciding exactly what to enter. I knew that I wanted to do something from the area but didn't quite know what to do. I was planning on doing a cut out of a grizzly bear face. My motivation came from the theater once again. One of the actors was redecorating his dressing room and he wanted a Maine Cabin decor.

I decided to contribute a lampshade to his room. This actor is in love with moose (I didn't know the plural of moose was moose--why not mooses or meese?). I started with craft paper lampshade with black trim. I knew that I wanted to do a moose silhouette that would only appear when the light was turned on. I glued the silhouette to the interior of the shade. The shade has 8" slanted sides. The top opening is 5 inches in diameter. The bottom opening is about 9" in diameter.

I then had several options--to repeat the pattern or to create different silhouettes to fill the space. I made each silhouette 6" in height so that the images wouldn't be too close to the bulb. I  treated each of the silhouettes with a heat retardant spray so there wouldn't be any problems with the heat.

I decided to do three different scenes. The shade is an Empire shape with a slip UNO fitting. This means that the light bulb holds the lampshade in place. More importantly, it allows the shade to rotate easily. I chose the three different scenes so the actor could rotate the shade as his preferences changed.

Bear Scene

Elk Scene

 I am very happy with the way this turned out. Everyone that has seen it seems to be pleased as well.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #15--Paper Suncatcher

Paper Suncatcher

The challenge for Challenge #15 was wee (as in tiny). I took a little liberty with the challenge and designed something that was small-ER than normal. The tiny/wee part comes with some of the tiny/thin cuts that were required to create this project. The overall size of the project is 5.5 inches square.

On a previous challenge, I created a Paper Stained Glass. The difference with that project that it wasn't translucent because each of the pieces where filled in with card stock. For this project, I wanted light to pass through the cutouts so that it would appear like stained glass.

The first step was to cut the piece out of black card stock to simulate the lead lines. As you can see, I always work with wide borders. Not only does this give you someplace to put your hands but it actually reduces the tension when you work on the inner-most or tiny areas. Of course, you have to work from the middle to the sides. For this project, I worked on all of the tiny little (wee) rounded triangles (you see what I did there?).

I forgot to take a photo of the pre-painted image. I then mounted the black card stock to plain white tissue. I then mounted it to another piece of tissue. So there are two layers of tissue.

Painted, untrimmed project

I realized that I really needed two layers of tissue and that I would have to work with a relatively dry brush. I used a very small liner brush dipped in undiluted liquid water colors. The only problems that I had were two areas that bled through because I didn't wipe my brush dry after changing colors. The brush was too wet.

Here is the underside (backside)
of the project. The second layer of
tissue really helped.

I then trimmed the image with a half inch border on each side. Right now, I am calling these paper suncatchers because I have placed them in an acrylic sign holder and have placed it in my office window. The below image is the project in its holder with a light behind it. I might want to turn these into lampshades.

Backlit project.

I don't know why the image seems so stretched out--maybe it is just the angle that I took the picture but the image really is 5.5 inches square.

Waiting for the sun

I am really pleased with the way that this turned out. Once I figured out the bleeding issue, I really didn't have any other problems. I worked on a light box so I could see how the colors would change once dried. I see a lot more of these in my future.

Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #14--More Quilt Squares (Study in Blues)

Logs (but small narrow ones)

Blue. I'm so BLUE. Not really but this challenge really challenged me. It wasn't that I had a dearth of ideas but I had so many that I couldn't decide and ended up wasting a couple of days trying to decide. The challenge became even more difficult in that I decided to continue on working on blocks for a future quilt.

These blocks were dedicated to logs (rectangles) and points (triangles). The points almost made me jump off the George Washington Bridge.

The design that I have been most enamored have been the log designs. I tried them in a larger (thicker) format but decided to try to do narrower rectangles to work on my seam allowances. With the larger rectangles, you have a lot of room for error. On narrow rectangles, much less so. The reason that I like the pattern so much is because there is less pre-measuring. You simply sew two sides to the length of the current side and then cut the opposing sides to the added length.

Although there is less blue here, I did feature the color in the design.

The second pattern featured rectangles, squares and triangles. In this example, I tried to work on the triangles meeting the points of the squares. I loved the blue against the red. As you can see, I ran out of the grey striped material and had to piece one side and it made it wonky in the process--LOL. You live and learn.

The third and fourth patterns really featured blue and POINTS. The classic star pattern proved to be most difficult and that I had to start and restart several times. As you can see, some of the points matched up better than others. I do love the two shades of blue and the pattern on pattern.

The final pattern made me dizzy in the process. I don't know the name of the pattern but I got so confused and at times couldn't remember where I was in the pattern. I think that this would be equivalent to a knitter losing count during a stitch pattern. On a larger scale, I think it would be too busy. Once again, sometimes the points met and sometimes they didn't.

One of my biggest regrets is that I don't have a washing machine. Therefore, I have to wash all of the material by hand, let it drip dry, and then sew it. The I have to repeat the process with the finished square and iron it.

So, hopefully I met the Blue Challenge even though it turned me blue in the face. When I worked with Isaac Mizrahi, he told me that he learned more about sewing from taking things apart than sewing them together. I never understood what he meant until I started these quilt blocks.