L'Homme avec un Parapluie

Oh, okay then, it's Umbrella Man... but he is en français!  That is to say, he's in Prima's En Francais paper collection:

I'm entering this for The Play Date Cafe's weekly colour challenge - they're looking for designs including combinations of Cotton Candy, Ruby, Citrus and Dusk.  I hope this fits the bill.  And I hope it will also work well for Fussy and Fancy's Friday challenge - Fancy Folds (how's that for alliteration?!).

This is also my entry for A Trip Down Memory Lane's sixth (yup, count'em) challenge, Scraplift It, from their Cybercrop weekend last week.  I'm afraid I haven't managed all the challenges.  Many of them were based around scrapbook pages, and that's not something I've really delved into yet.  But you can see my entry for Challenge 1 here if you're interested.

Challenge 6 is all about taking inspiration from somebody else's project - known as "lifting", and we were invited to scraplift from the Gallery of ATDML's Design Team.  I chose one of Ann Freeman's projects from the June Gallery, a lovely gatefold card.  I really wanted to try out that structure for a card.  I love the idea of something hidden then being revealed.

So yet another member of Team Umbrella Man was deployed, this time to France.  I got the Prima En Francais 6x6 pad a while back, and although I've used the odd paper here and there, I'd never focussed a project around it.  What a gorgeous collection it is!

But I didn't want to be covering it up too much, so I selected a slightly plainer page from Paper Cellar's Victorian Classic to tone in with the Prima ones, and that I've added some stamping and embossing to, selecting images which match those in the En Francais sheets.


Here's Kaisercraft's Eiffel Tower embossed with clear powder over Sepia Archival Ink with a touch of Aged Mahogany on the stamp too (I know, I know, I shouldn't really mix them, but Aged Mahogany by itself was just too rich a red.




The crown here is from one of my favourite sets, Pink Paislee's London Market (new abbreviation suggestion: PPLM - can you bear it?  I just seem to have to type it an awful lot), and the little envelope is cut from one of the other En Francais sheets, backed on card and edged with some Weathered Wood Distress Ink (that would be by Tim Holtz, in case anyone's forgotten!).


I also cut the key trim from the other sheet to edge this fold of the card with... I've done the same on many of the edges.  The patterns on these little strips are just adorable.  The attention to detail, as with all Prima papers, is phenomenal.


I put a touch of Glossy Accents on the red ribbon on the envelope, as I wanted to pick out that detail...


... to go with the actual little red bow I made and attached on the opposite fold.  The only ribbon I had that was narrow enough was a bright scarlet (off some Christmas presents aeons ago, stored and hoarded ever since for the day when I would find a use for it), and looked horrid against the browny-reds of the card.


I used Vintage Photo Distress Stain (TH!) to just tone it down a little, and was very pleased with the result.  I did, however, get very sticky fingers trying to glue it into the bow shape.










So that's what's on the front...  Here it is lying flat, so that you can see how Umbrella Man overlaps onto the other side.  That was one of the adaptations I made to the sketch I was lifting: I'm not much of a one for symmetricality; I like things slightly off-centre, or skewiff.


Now we get to open up the flaps... one at a time now...

First glimpse you get of the inside gives you the TH Eiffel Tower embossed on the inner flap to echo the outer, smaller Eiffel Tower (same colours, same process), as well as a glimpse of another use of the newly-dyed ribbon.


Bunting seems to be everywhere at the moment, I guess because of the Jubilee, but this is a French card, so I've Frenchified the bunting.  Why that should mean it hangs vertically instead, I don't know... but that was the shape I felt I needed to balance the columns created by the flaps of the card.



Again, the little cards are cut from one of the Prima sheets, mounted on card, and inked with Weathered Wood to give a little definition to the edges.


I punched holes using the second smallest punch on my revolving hole punch, and threaded them on to another length of 'vintage scarlet' ribbon.  


Cheat sheet: they're attached in the simplest possible way - with sticky tape on the back side of the card!  I originally had them dangling completely freely, but that caused trouble when closing the card, so now the bottom one has a dab of glue holding it in place.


And here's the fully opened card:

Again, I just want to draw your attention to some of the delights of the detail in the papers:


... these gorgeous tickets of entry to all sorts of lovely places tucked in the corner of the central paper... 




... and then the trim alongside the Eiffel Tower stamp, and the fleur-de-lys one on the opposite edge.  


I love how you can just see Umbrella Man standing with his back to you round the edge of this flap!


So, I hope you like it.  I had a lovely time creating it: playing with these delicious papers can't help but inspire you.  


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A walk about Paris will provide lessons in history, beauty, and in the point of Life.
Thomas Jefferson