Handmade Collection Inspiration | Handcrafted Rainbow Quills by Jenny Colacicco

Hi everyone!  This is Jenny from JC Cards and I am beyond thrilled to be joining you today on the Spellbinders Paper Arts blog.  This guest post is the first in a series of three, showcasing the stamps and dies in the Handmade collection by Stephanie Low.  This is a wonderful collection which features images from hobbies and crafts including stitching, cooking, and painting, all in Stephanie’s unique style.

My project today features the One of a Kind and Handcrafted stamp and die sets, and was inspired by the artistic imagery of the collection.

I’m a huge fan of feathers and the beautiful quill pen in the One of Kind set was so detailed and stylish that I really wanted to make it the focal point of my card by making it pop with bright colors against a neutral background.

To create my card, I first stamped the quill pen three times onto white hot press watercolor cardstock using clear embossing ink.  Hot press is very smooth and is therefore ideal for stamping more detailed images.  I heat embossed the image using superfine white embossing powder.  Two tips for heat embossing on watercolor cardstock:

• firstly, as with any cardstock, be sure to treat it with an anti-static powder tool in order to avoid getting embossing powder sticking where you don’t want it;
• and secondly, get your heat tool good and hot before you melt the powder, being sure not to overheat it.

I have noticed that embossing powder has a tendency to ‘sink’ into watercolor cardstock if you heat it for too long, which can result in a more muted or flat image.  As soon as the powder melts and turns shiny, move your heat gun away.

Using my watercolor brush markers, I swiped stripes of color roughly across each of the quills in rainbow order from purple, pink, red, yellow, green, blue to grey.  I used a blender pen to blend and smooth out the colors (you could also use a water brush) and then added some sparkle with a clear shimmer pen.  When dry, I die-cut them out using the co-ordinating die in my Platinum 6.

I foam mounted the die cut feathers onto a landscape A2 card base made from grey cardstock, and then lightly spattered it with gold spray using a paintbrush.

The sentiment is from the Handcrafted set and was stamped in clear embossing ink onto black cardstock and heat embossed in white embossing powder.  I die cut it out using the co-ordinating die, and popped it up on a second layer of foam squares, doubling up on either end where the sentiment overhangs the quills.   As a finishing touch I rounded the corners.

Spellbinders Supplies:

• SDS-071 Handcrafted
• SDS-078 One of a Kind
• PE-100 Platinum 6 Die Cutting and Embossing Machine

Other Supplies​:

Cardstock: Simon Says Stamp Smoke, Fabriano Artistico Extra White Aquarello Hot Press 140lb, Catherine Pooler Designs Midnight, Embossing Powder: WOW! Opaque Bright White Superfine, Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers (080 Violet, 025 Pink, 020 Red, 051, Lemon Yellow, 004 Fl. Green, 031 Cobalt Blue, 036 Light Blue, 091 Light Grey), Zig Blender, Scrapbook Adhesives foam squares, Heidi Swapp Color Shine Gold, Wink of Stella Clear, We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper (¼”).

I hope you enjoyed my card today.  Please feel free to leave me a comment below if you have any questions.  I will be stopping by again with more from the Handmade Stephanie Low collection so stay tuned!  Until then, have a wonderful day all!