Beginner’s Guide to Cardmaking: How To Make A Handmade Card

Hello and welcome back to the second part of the Beginners Cardmaking Series. It’s Lisa Tilson here with you again, and today we will be looking at how to make a handmade card. Let’s jump straight in!

The most common card size in the USA is an A2 format, and this is often a size that is adopted by crafters around the globe. There are of course many other shapes and sizes of cards, and these will be covered in the next part of the series. For today’s purposes, the focus will be on A2.

Let’s start by talking about the essentials of creating any A2 card.

Card Bases and Card Panels

When creating a handmade card, you might hear, read, or see creators referring to A2 card bases or A2 note cards and A2 card panels. A card base/note card is simply a heavyweight piece of cardstock that will serve as the base for your final design. All you need to make a note card is some heavyweight cardstock, a paper trimmer, a scoring board, and a bone folder. The Spellbinders ColorWheel Cardstock works well for bases as well as panels.

Card Bases

A2 Vertical Top Folding Card – all you need to do is trim a sheet of cardstock to 11” x 4.25” and then score and fold it at 5.5” (see photo above). This type of card orientation can double up as a side folding horizontal card!

A2 Horizontal Top Folding Card – trim a sheet of cardstock to 8.5” x 5.5” and then score and fold it at 4.25” (see photo below). Again, you can use this base with the fold on the left side rather than the top to achieve a different orientation.

Card Panels

An A2 card panel is an additional layer that can be adhered to the note card after you have completed your design. You do not have to use an extra layer for your card design. You could in fact create directly onto the card base and this can work well when you are clear about which way your design is headed. If you are not 100% sure, it is often preferable to work on a card panel in case you need to start again. Less card wastage is a good thing!

An A2 card panel measures 5.5” x 4.25”. The picture above shows four panels cut to 5.5” x 4.25” which, when placed together, are the size of a sheet of ColorWheel Cardstock (11” x 8.5”).

From this one sheet of cardstock you can cut multiple options:

four A2 panels
two card bases
a combination of one card base and two A2 panels.

Cardstock

What else might you need to make your handmade card? You will more than likely want to add some colour, and what better way than with Spellbinders ColorWheel Cardstock. The ColorWheel Cardstock weighs 100 lb/270 gsm, which means that it will work equally well for card bases as well as individual A2 panels. It comes in 48 beautifully created colours, including black and white. To cut your cardstock sheets into panels, you will get the best finish by using a trimmer.

One Layer vs Multiple Layers For Adding Dimension

When designing your card, you can keep it simple and create a design directly onto the card base. This type of design is often referred to as a one-layer card.

Alternatively, as mentioned earlier, create your design on a separate panel and adhere it to your card base. See the example below, where the design has been created using a card base with an A2 panel adhered on top. The sentiment has been stamped directly onto the panel, and the pretty floral die cuts have been added around it.

You may also wish to add additional layers to further accentuate your design. There are many ways to add dimension and layers! Here are a few:

Using nesting/layering dies
Using an embossing folder
Using a foiled or letterpressed or stencilled panel
Using patterned paper
Using an ink-blended panel

Below is a card example that has multiple layers. You have your base card, an A2 panel of light grey cardstock adhered onto that, plus two white scalloped rectangle panels on top of that. The top white scalloped panel has been added with foam tape to give you even more dimension and interest. The flowers, sentiments, and embellishments make up the top layer.

Nesting dies come in many shapes and sizes and allow you to build your card using the same shape (but different-sized) panel on each layer. The card below has a base card followed by an A2 foiled panel of script text. You then have a further two layers created by using the Essential Arches Etched Dies in two different sizes. The flowers sit in the centre, framed perfectly by the arches.

What Will Be Your Focal Point?

This can be a stamped, pressed or foiled image or even just a bold sentiment. It could be something created purely using die cuts. It is the area of the card that your eye is immediately drawn to. Pictured below are some samples of different focal points. On the left you have the pressed flower with a rainbow background. Your eye is drawn to the flower in three ways:

by the ink blending that surrounds it (it fades from dark to almost white in the centre)
by the colour of the pressed image
by the oval frame

The top right card features a baking apron decorated with flowers and finished with a sentiment and embellishments. The size of the apron alone makes it the focal point of this card.

The bottom right card has a pressed sentiment as a focal point, and it is accentuated by some small flowers.

What Layout Will You Use?

So, how do you decide on the layout for your card? For many crafters, this can be the hardest part of making a card. Later in this series, design principles will be covered in more detail, but here are a few pointers for when you are starting out.

Sketch out your design on scrap paper.
Replicate a design from a previous card you have made.
Take part in card challenges that provide a sketch layout for you to use. This is a great way of experimenting with different designs.
Go through your supplies and see if anything creates a spark. You may find inspiration using a nesting die that you use often, or you may decide that you want to use a recently purchased embossing folder, and that will form the basis of your card.
Who are you creating for? Is there anything they particularly love that you could include in your design?
Consider the rule of thirds (this will be covered in more detail as part of the design principles post later in the series)

Don’t be afraid to change the size of your card to fit your idea! You may find that your idea works better on a shaped card or an A7-sized card. See example above where the flowers have been added to an arch-shaped card with simple detailing around the outside. Although this could have been created on a rectangular card just as easily, the arch shape gave it an added bit of interest.

What Colours Will You Use?

Selecting colours will be covered in more detail in design principles. However, there are some simple ways to help guide you when picking what you want to use on your card.

Use the Spellbinders Color Deck System to help inspire you. This is a system of 52 cards that includes an image, spaces for you to swatch your customised colours, some fun facts, and helpful information around colour theory.

Refer to a colour wheel. A colour wheel shows the relationship been primary, secondary, and tertiary colours and how they interact with each other to create a harmonious, balanced design.
Make swatches of your inks and cardstocks. This is a great way to see how colours sit together and what may work for your design.
Take inspiration from things around you! Colours you see in a magazine, or on television, in a store, for example. That can really help spark your creativity!

What Medium Do You Want To Use

This might be the simplest of the decisions you make when thinking about your card. You may be someone who loves to blend inks, or loves to colour with markers, or you like to dabble with paint, and you may always veer towards the mediums you love. That is totally okay! Remember, this card is an expression of you, and making it should be enjoyable. However, is there a medium that you want to try experimenting with. This might be the time to try!

In addition, you may well be guided by what product you are going to use – a stamped image, a foiled or pressed image, a die-cut flower with some ink blending on it. You may even be swayed by what you know the recipient would love to see on a card.

What Tools Might You Need To Make A Handmade Card

The Beginners Guide to Cardmaking Series will take a closer look at basic essential tools for making a handmade card in a later post. Depending on your card design, you may need a selection of the following tools:

Platinum SIX Die Cutting Machine
Stamping Tool
Glimmer Hot Foil System
BetterPress LetterPress System
Adhesives, scissors, colouring mediums, foam adhesive squares, tweezers, blending brushes, scoring board, glass mat, palette knife, masking sheets, punches, pick-up tool, sticky mat, t-square ruler, pencil, etc

Whatever way you decide to go with creating your handmade card, enjoy the process of making it. Experiment sometimes, maybe try something you haven’t done before, you never know where that might lead you. Don’t be afraid to start over or come back to it another day if you aren’t happy with what you have created. It’s all part of the learning process! We hope you find this post helpful when thinking about how you might go about creating your cards. Join us for part three soon where we will be talking about different card sizes.