Mood Board Inspiration - Guest Designing for Simon Says Stamp

Hello all!  I'm delighted to be back in the Designer Spotlight for the second of my October guest posts for the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge.  I was so inspired by the fabulous Mood Board which forms this week's challenge theme prompt... and I love where that inspiration took me!  There will be a YouTube Few Minutes of Fun video later this week with the full process for these altered candle lanterns but, for today, I hope you'll enjoy taking a look at the finished results here.

This week we're inspired by a gorgeous autumnal moodboard - and we hope you will be too.  Do check out all the incredible projects over on the main challenge blog - as always, the team have created some glorious makes to get your creative juices flowing!

My project is a three dimensional one, inspired by the candles, the autumn leaves and fir branches, the black-framed umbrella with those wonderful raindrops... well, almost everything really.

Here's that mood board so that you can see for yourselves what I'm talking about from here on in!  As soon as I saw the candlelight and those vintage spectacles, my brain went straight to candle lanterns.  I've altered a lot of old jars to create candle holders over the years... but you can never have too many candles, right?!

As I mentioned, there'll be a video where you can follow along the whole process coming out this Saturday (I'll add links to that here once it's live), but for now, here's a quick outline of what I did.  First I made sure my jar was nice and clean.  And then I glued on some of the gorgeous Tim Holtz Idea-ology Halloween Collage Paper using some matte medium.

I have to say, I don't find this paper particularly spooky - it's simply beautiful with its mixture of text, music, organic natural elements and decorative ironwork.

I love the ornate iron gates.  And the imagery includes some greenery which works well to echo the shadowy fir branches in the left-hand picture in the mood board.

I wanted some shimmering autumnal leaves too, of course.  Those glowing leaves on the left of the mood board were the second thing to catch my eye after the candlelight...

I always have a big batch of them cut at this time of year, so I had some ready to go.  (You can watch a YouTube video for those too, right here.)  As well as the Bigz Layered Leaf die, these are a mixture of the Tim Holtz Sizzix Thinlits sets Fall Foliage and Leaf Fragments layered up together.

There's Distress Mica Stain - Jack O'Lantern and Flickering Candle - in amongst the Distress Spray Stains - Vintage Photo, Crackling Campfire and Rusty Hinge, as well as many more.  With all the shimmer on the leaves, with either the sunlight or the candlelight catching them, they even have that glow that you see on the mood board.  (This is the large Layered Leaf Bigz die, which comes with its own embossing folder to create the texture.)

I added some Idea-ology Design Tape from the Elementary collection around the tops of the jars.  

Not only did that give me a nice neat finish around the screw top part of the jar, but it also echoes the gold frames of the spectacles... especially when seen from above!

The black metal spokes of the umbrella inspired me to create some wire handles out of simple garden wire, and I thought I'd like some raindrops too, like the ones shimmering on the clear plastic of that umbrella.

So I dug some round droplets (flat-backed) out of my stash and used Glossy Accents to stick them onto the jars, in fairly random places.

I love the additional texture they add but even more than that I love the way they catch the light as the jars move, and as the candles flicker.

Because, of course, that's the magic moment with these jars. They look good in bright sunlight when they seem most solid...

They look good when the light is behind them and you can really appreciate the translucence of the collage paper...

But maybe they look best of all when those tealights are lit and flickering away inside!

I'll be sharing a Reel of the daylight and nighttime looks over on Instagram, but you can also see the candles lit in the YouTube video from Saturday onwards.

I hope you'll be able to take advantage of at least one of those options to see these candle lanterns in action, moving from day to night...

I hope that's given you a kick start of inspiration for the beautiful challenge Mood Board this week at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge.  As always, the incredible team regulars have offered up a wealth of wonderful projects, so do make sure you hop over to check those out. 

 

As ever, they'll be spotlighting some of your creations at the end of the week, and of course there's the usual Simon Says Stamp voucher to be won in a random draw, so that you can treat yourself to a little shopping spree!

I can't wait to hear what you think of these lanterns - I think they're some of my favourite candle jars that I've made - and I hope you'll join us this week in creating something inspired by this beautiful autumnal Mood Board. 

And just to tempt you even further to visit the YouTube Few Minutes of Fun episode on Saturday... you'll see more than just these two lit up at the end!!

Thanks so much for stopping by today, and happy crafting, all!

If we are to have any hope for the future, those who have lanterns must pass them on to others.

Plato

I am out with lanterns, looking for myself.

Emily Dickinson

If you light a lantern for another, it will also brighten your own way.

Nichiren

Selling, Branding, Advertising

Hello, all!  In between a LOT of exciting things going on behind the scenes (watch this space on 30th June!) I found a bit more playtime with the fabulous new vintage advertising Flea Market Finds collection by Cathe Holden.  Spellbinders kindly invited me to create with some of the new ephemera, stickers, stamps and papers, and I've been having a lovely time making another batch of teabag sachets with them.

These travelling salesmen are some of the legion of men and boys who made their way around the country hawking, peddling, selling any goods, provisions, inventions and ideas they could to make a living. 

With so many of them all trying to make a buck, it all came down to how you could compete in the market - how could you convince someone to buy your product rather than someone else's?  

Patents, branding and advertising became the lifeblood of the travelling salesman, and this collection captures that feverish excitement and those endeavours so well with all the labels, stamps, seals, posters, cigarette cards and other gimmickry used to catch the eye and promote whatever was on sale.

In the recent catch-up post, you saw a number of these little series... the tiny collage space is such fun to work with.  Mind you, when my mother has mostly been drinking fennel tea, they do smell quite a lot!

I started out by gessoing the sachets and then covering them (I've always just painted them before) with some of the papers from the Neutrals Palette Sampler. 

That also got a wash of gesso to give it a more weathered look, and a little splatter of what was left on the craft mat.  

Then I got to work picking out some labels and other ephemera from the Home Arts Miscellany and Happy Thought Miscellany packs.   

I particularly love the elegant glove-shaped advertisement...

... the wonderful photo someone is carrying with them on their travels (maybe that's Pa who stayed at home on the farmstead?)...

... and the house as the logo for the manufacturer and dealer in turpentine (amongst other things).

Over on the reverse, there are some of the Etiquettes Stickers and some stamps and seals from the Circle Labels Icons Stamps.

I then realised that it was all very well having all these leaflets and logos and advertising cards... what the collages needed now was the travelling salesmen to do the hawking and promoting.

Time to get out the Paper Dolls Minis - just the right size for a tiny collage space like these teabag sachets.

It didn't take long to track down my peddlers, hawkers, hucksters and vendors, each of them ready to wear out his shoe leather in search of more customers.

Some of them are clearly right at the start of their endeavours.

Others are considerably more experienced and/or more prosperous.   (Don't judge me - I'm a little bit smitten with this guy and his smouldering gaze.  Whatever he's selling, I'm buying!)

Maybe they've even settled down with an emporium of their own now, with no need to go on the road any longer.

But the commercial travellers are as vital a part of the American story as any rancher or railway builder.  In a way, their values are the ones that have prevailed most strongly in today's society.

Certainly the advertising industry that grew out of these humble beginnings has become a huge part of the way we live now.  Buying and selling, promoting and branding, they're central to how the economy ticks over.

And these guys were there at the start of it all...  That's the journey these great little pieces of historical ephemera took me on today, anyway!  

I hope you like this little collection of teabag sachet collages.  If you click on any of the links in this post, you can take a closer look at the products I've used.  And if you make any purchases while you're there, I'll get a small commission, without you having to pay anything extra.  See, I'm at it now too!

Happy weekend all!  I'll see you on Monday for the last of my weeks in the Simon Says Stamp Designer Spotlight... watch out - it's a scary one!!

He could sell snow to an Eskimo.

Overheard in a real estate office.