PaperArtsy Topics 2015

Over the past year we have run different topics every 2 weeks, bringing tons of inspiration from signature designers and guest bloggers. each topic was accompanied by a challenge, with lots of you joining in regularly. So much inspiration, it has been a terrific year over there.

As well as doing posts for some of the topics I also made myself this little journal. It is not full of pretty, perfect art, it was never meant as that. I wanted this just as a reminder of the year. It is filled with colour schemes, techniques and products, aswell as favourite stamps and stencils. 

As this is really just for me, i was in two minds as to whether I would show it.. As I said, some of the pages look a little rough, they are not polished projects.. But i am pleased with the book as a whole, it's a great reminder.. So I decided to show you.. 

Darcy x

ARC November

Welcome to the November meeting of Arc.

This month I started reading The coloured pencil painting bible, by Alyona Nickelsen...and reading is the right word, boy there is so much text in there. Not a whole lot of pictures, at least not in the first half. For anyone wanting a quick solution to an arty problem... this is not the book for you. This book requires dedicated reading to make full use of it. I do intend to work my way through it and do some drawing along the way, but there is no way i could complete that for this month. The text is a bit heavy going, though I know it is all useful stuff.

So I grabbed a book that has been on the shelf for a while, I think i picked it up at a charity shop..

The boy in the dress by David Walliams

I had imagined this book to be very funny, full of witty banter, I guess because the characters that The author plays on tv. However it was a bit of a disappointing read, not a dreadful book by any means, but.. just not.. gripping.. you know?

Having said that, this is clearly a kids book. I would say aimed at no older than about 10yrs. It is about a boy who, as the title suggests, wears a dress. The book deals with family splits, the distance between child and parent, feeling 'different' wanting to be an individual but not wanting others to laugh... and most importantly it deals with friendships, and how no matter what you do, your real friends will always be there for you.

When I say it deals with these issues, it doesn't, not in any great details, but it does touch on them. I think for the intended age range there are enough good moral points and guidelines for how people really should be more accepting of each others differences.

I have no problem in keeping and reading kids books, but this one is neither a great read or a classic, so now that it has been read I shall take it back to the charity shop.


I started my page  with spray inks, followed by white acrylic applied with a textured brayer.

Incidentaly if anyone knows where I can get a Fiskars brayer called 'Streamers' preferably really cheap, then please let me know. it is now discontinued. I have the handles I just need the roller. 

I then added some white gesso to the edges, putting it on roughly to create ridges.

love the texture, I had to tone it down a bit as it started to look like snow, and I didn't want that. 

I then rubbed Treasure gold onto the outer ridges..

once the treasure gold is dry it can be polished..

next I stamped a little row of houses, and coloured those with Fresco paint. 

I also stamped hahahaha all over the background, highlighting some of the letters with gold paint. 

Finally I wanted to add the boy in a dress, but this is as far as I got, I am not happy with it and need to do it again. I will get that done and edit this post to add the final photo in. 

if you are playing along with ARC then link up here.. 

When is a journal not a journal?

When it's a notebook,reading book,diary or pile of loose paper just waiting to be used 'as' a journal..

I have recently been having discussions about which journals are best for arting..and where to get them.

So here are a few of mine. Not a comprehensive review by any means, just a few quick photos and my thoughts on them.

I have bought lots..LOTS of these journal from Asda, my local supermarket. They are just over £2 each for the A5 size, not that much more for the A4 size. They come in plain paper and also graph paper.

They have an off white paper inside, a hard cover with a faux leather finish, and an elastic band that keeps them closed. The paper really is a decent weight, but I use a lot of heavy wet media and choose to glue 2 pages together for strength. it's not a problem as there are lots of pages. 80 of them.

Here is a journal page I did in my Asda book.

Next up are my moleskines, I bought these..from The Book Depository They measure approx 5inches by 8.25inches. The paper is a creamy colour and is quite thin. I do like the paper but it really is no good for a lot of wet media, however it stands up pretty well to paint when you glue 2 pages together. They are good value as you get 3 in a pack and being smaller than A5 they are a handy size. They come in 4 colours.

here is a page I made in my moleskine..

Now we have Seawhites journals. See your local stockist HERE... these are AMAZING value, the A5 is £1.08 and the A4 is £1.49. The paper is just off white and is 140gsm. It specifically says on the back that is is for extra wet media. I found them so cheap I actually bought one to cut up and make pages for a different book.

Next is a sketchbook, it was from Sainsburys..another uk supermarket, and was around £5. The paper is off white and is a decent weight cartridge paper. it takes wet media just fine. The only drawback is that it is spiral bound...great for opening the book wide but not so great if you want to do a double spread.

This is a page I made in mine, using gesso, water soluble neocolours and prisma pencils

Another journal I bought recently is this one. I wanted one that specifically had very smooth paper inside, as I wanted to use it with my markers. I believe I paid around £2.25 for this one, just in a local stationery shop(WHSmiths). it is not a branded one. It has a plastic cover back and front, but inside the back cover is a piece of sturdy card which gives you something to rest on.

The paper is white and smooth enough for markers.The only drawback with markers is that they do bleed through to the reverse, for this reason after each page is complete I glue it back to back to the next page. if I was using a different medium I probably wouldn't need to do that as these pages are a pretty good weight.

I just loved the look of this next one, it is from PAPERCHASE... I love it because of the size/shape. It is just under 10inches square, and was only £4.50. The paper is so lovely, really smooth ..but is thin. I would say the same as the Moleskine paper. I haven't used this yet, but I know I will definitely have to glue pages together for strength.

Now we have the charity shop book. I  think this was 20p. it is just an old book, approx 8x5inches and hard backed. The paper is really thick and very matte. it takes all kinds of media. 

I love that you can still see the text of the pages through the artwork. 

Lastly I have a load of these old diaries..These were completely free, hard backed and full of interesting pages such as lists and maps. The paper is a really decent heavy weight and I am sure it will make a great journal. 

Of course you can just make a journal...from anything. I have glued sheets of newspaper together and gessoed over them to make journal pages, you can use watercolour paper, corrugated card, acrylic sheets, leaflets,junk mail, anything and everything...

Here are pages of newspaper glued together and covered in gesso...

and here is a page I made on one of them 

Don't feel all your pages have to be the same size..... 

have a look AT THIS...blog post to see how I made it.... 

Starting to art journal DOES NOT mean you have to rush out and buy an expensive book....

I hope that helps you get started. 

Cotton Candy Girls

A while ago I signed up to do an online course with the gorgeous NATASA, I love her whimsy artwork, and when she decided to launch her first course I wanted to join in.

She called it Cotton Candy Girls, and in total we received 5 lessons and then 3 bonus lessons. Each lesson had videos and pdfs, and was well thought out with clear videos and very detailed pdfs.

I didn't have time to do the lessons as they were posted, but as everything was available to download, I was able to work through them at my own pace.

Each piece was done on either canvas or in a journal, but I felt I wanted to work on something that I could actually continue to use. So off I went to the charity shop and came home with some hard backed books, they were only 20p each. For the price of all of them I couldn't have bought even one canvas, so I was very pleased.

At first I thought I would pull out all the pages, and just use the covers...and then refill with blank pages. But then I got to thinking I could just alter the pages.

I really enjoyed painting these and would highly recommend you keep an eye on Natasa's blog for when she launches her next course.

So here are my finished Cotton Candy Girls.

week 1. The Angel

and the back..

week 2. Funky Hair Girl

week 3. Fairy Girl

week 4. Rainbow Girl

week 5. Girl with Cat

and the back...

There were 3 bonus lessons, one was a boy which I didnt fancy doing, so here are the 2 bonus girls that I did.

Bonus 1. Bonus Girl

and the back..

Bonus 2.  Soul Sisters

and now for the insides, so far I have ripped out pages, glued pages together, cut out secret compartments and created drawers. None of them are finished yet, so I shall just show you a few photos of the insides 'in progress' Now that the covers area ll done they will sit on the bookshelf and I can work in them like journals as i need to.. i think it will take a very long time to fill all 7 books, but I shall show you bits from them as I go along.

In this one I glued pages together to make them sturdy, and then at the back I glued a whole chunk of pages together and cut out section for matchboxes to slide into.

In this next one I cut out a secret compartment, no idea what i will put in here..

and in this one I cut out a centre section and added in a small journal..

Obviously there is lots of work still to be done on the insides...