NEW WORKSHOP: Memory Village

We have a new and exciting workshop coming in September called Memory Village.

This cute project uses the Artful Dwellings Bigz L die by Tim Holtz. I managed to source this die from Ebay about 2 months ago as unfortunately this die is now retired. I knew as soon as I got it that I wanted to use it for a workshop project.

The houses are die cut from chipboard and I cut two each of each house so that they could be layered together for extra stability. This also enables you to join each house together, sandwiching the tape in-between the houses.

Each house is covered with a decoupage paper in a newsprint design and I used Tim Holtz Vintage Distress Collage Medium to adhere the paper to the chipboard. This helps tint the colour of the backing paper for a vintage effect.

Once the collage medium had dried I added some paint to two of the houses and just applied this using my finger and then rubbing off the excess paint using a dried baby wipe. Once my backgrounds had been created I then had fun adding pieces of ephemera from the Tim Holtz Ephemera Pack Snippets and Tim Holtz Layers Botanical. I also added some pieces of vintage lace to add a contrast of texture to each house.

I added some stamped imagery using a variety of floral, bird and stitching stamp designs. Finally I finished off each house using some Tim Holtz Chit Chat stickers and also Tim Holtz Clippings stickers. I also added a little splatter of paint to each house.

To join the houses together I used a brown paper tape and cut small pieces that I backed together. I then glued these in place, sandwiching them in between the two pieces of chipboard.

This project was so fun to make and is definitely a great gift idea leading up to the festive season. These home decor pieces look great on a shelf of a bookcase and are a creative way to display your favourite photos.

For more information about the workshop and how to book please click here.

REWIND SERIES: By the Sea Framed Panel

Inspired by our workshop with Tim Holtz in 2016, 'Distress a Little Different', we decided to create a framed panel project that our ladies could make on our Ilfracombe Craft Retreat.

We painted the wooden panel with Tim Holtz Distress Paint and then added some highlights of colour using Distress Crayons. To add some flecks of gold we used Ranger foil sheets with a Ranger prick stick adhesive. 

Moving onto the background of the collage, we first layered pieces of ephemera (a mixture of Tim Holtz ephemera and nautical themed ephemera we found ourselves) and then added some colour using Distress Crayons. We also included some texture by adding some stencilling with Ranger texture paste.

Moving onto the foreground of the collage we added a framed box with a photo of an old vintage Ilfracombe postcard. The framed box was inspired by the mini boxes from the Tim Holtz Configuration boxes. This was then painted with Distress paint with some added detailing using Distress Crayons.

Underneath the box we added some scrabble letter embellishments that we had painted to add some extra colour. Extra embellishments included a vial bottle with a rolled up vintage image in, some die cut seaweed embellishments and die cut seagulls.

All in all a beautiful piece of home decor that our guests can hang up in their homes and remind them of the Ilfracombe Craft Retreat.

REWIND SERIES: Ilfracombe Craft Retreat 2016

I can't believe this craft retreat escaped the blog back in 2016! After the success of our first craft retreat in 2015 in St Ives, we decided to host another retreat but this time we headed to North Devon to the small harbour town of Ilfracombe.

We hired out a property in a beautiful spot on the edge of the harbour with beautiful views out to sea. Our house was called Quayfield House and can be found on Holiday Cottages website if you fancy hiring the house for your own craft retreat. Although it was in a beautiful location the steps leading up to the property were a bit of a killer!!

Our retreat was Saturday to Wednesday and included 4 projects that our guests would be making over those days. We organised 2 big projects for Sunday and Tuesday, with 2 smaller evening projects to fit in alongside those. Everyone had a free day on Monday to explore Ilfracombe and do some sight seeing.

We will be going into further detail about each project on each of their own blog posts so you can see more up close pictures and a deeper description of what we used and how we made them.

DAY 1

After breakfast on Sunday morning we laid out the table for the first project of the retreat which was By the Sea Framed Panel. 

Since it was the first day of projects we also provided a little gift from us which was a Vintage Follie apron!

I think we can all agree the ladies looked great in them!

Our view from the craft table was wonderful, looking out over the harbour. Although I think it may have been a bit distracting at times!

After the first project on Day 1 we organised dinner for everyone at the house and then got the table set up for our first evening project which was Seaside Memory Jar.

DAY 2

Due to bad weather on the 2nd day of the retreat we decided to bring the projects forward a day so that our guests could enjoy their free day to explore Ilfracombe in better weather conditions, since Tuesday was looking like the nicer day.

Our first project of the day was Traveller's Mini Photo book.

We always like to include a project that our guests can put photos in to remind them of their retreat or perhaps save it for a trip in the future.

Our evening project for Day 2 was a lovely memento for the trip to remind them of their travels at Christmas time. We were making an Ilfracombe Christmas Bauble.

We decorated the baubles with mica flakes that were a seaside mix of colours to fit in beautifully with the theme of the project. We found some vintage seaside images that we could shrink down in size and glue to the front of the bauble. We then decorated round the edge with some Stickles glitter glue. 

Everyone also made a box that fitted the bauble inside perfectly to keep it protected until they could hang it up on their Christmas tree.

DAY 3:

Today was everyone's free day to go out and explore what Ilfracombe had to offer and get some souvenirs to take home.

We had fun exploring the town and even took a ride on the town's Dotto Land Train to travel around Ilfracombe's tourist destinations.

I couldn't help but take a picture of this board we found outside one of the local coffee shops. So the next time you find yourself debating eating a cake, don't think twice!

So that is the end of our story about our fantastic craft retreat to Ilfracombe in 2016. Unfortunately we haven't planned any since this retreat as life has just been getting in the way. But it is definitely on the cards and we are constantly looking for beautiful locations to organise our next retreat at so who knows, a Vintage Follie Craft Retreat could be coming your way soon.....

Let's Recap.....

Hi bloggers......

so after looking at my blog quite closely for the past few months I found that over the past 3 years (2016 - 2019) I have a total of 17 blog posts......what can I say....life took over and unfortunately the blog got pushed to the whey side. But hopefully this is the beginning of a new chapter of more frequent posts, not just about crafting but what goes into our Vintage Follie life.

Recently I have been inspired by the vlogs of a nearby craft company called CS Get Crafty. They are also a mother and daughter team and after watching the ins and outs of their lives, including craft makes, workshops, craft retreats, trips and days out I decided that I wanted to be more inclusive from now on. If you haven't checked out CS Get Crafty, make sure you stop by their website and check out their workshops which are based in Brighton.

Even though our blog posts have been few and far between we have still been organising some craft workshops, some of which I have posted about but I often failed to recap on the day or missed it out completely.

So over the next few weeks I am launching a REWIND series to recap on craft makes, retreats and jumble sales that I failed to write about at the time. Thank goodness I still took photos with the intentions of coming back to the blog at a later date. So get ready for an inspirational couple of weeks (or month - there is a lot to share!) to see what craftiness we have been up to since 2016!

Before I finish up this post I thought I would give you a brief update on some life changes that have also occurred......

So since 2016 I have met the love of my life...Conor..who also proposed to me in June this year and we are now happily engaged!! (another wedding series on the blog may occur!)

I've travelled to some beautiful and vibrant cities including Rome and New York. 

I've changed jobs twice in one year - have I found my dream job? - not by any means....but it allows me to be creative with installing window displays and helping out with visual merchandising. Plus it reminds me of my favourite UK destination everyday....Cornwall!

who knows...another career change could be on the cards in the future. 

I have a favourite little girl in my life after becoming an auntie at the end of 2017, who has also featured in a few craft makes over the past year.

In March 2018 I organised my first Craft Jumble Sale in Crawley. After me and mum had a mass clear out of the craft room I was looking for somewhere we could successfully sell our second hand craft items but I couldn't find anything that was frequent enough in the area. So after asking a few other crafters what they thought of the idea of a Craft Jumble Sale I found myself organising one in our local community hall. It was a huge success and after having organised two more sales since then, I think we can say it's been a mighty success. For further information about our Craft Jumble Sales head over to the Craft Jumble Sale Crawley Facebook page for details of our next sale.

The biggest change came last year when I moved out from my childhood home and bought my first house - this has kept me unbelievably busy since the end of last year. Also spending less time around mum has also inhibited both our desires to craft so we try to make the most of days we can spend together in the craft room.

Finally October last year saw me turn the milestone of 30 years old - so cheers to the next decade of my life with many exciting times ahead.

So there's my life update in a nut shell and the reasoning for us being a bit AWOL over the past 3 years but I'm hoping from this post on we can get back to providing more inspiration, crafty goodness and more regular updates on our Vintage Follie life.

Alcohol Ink Brooch Workshop

A day spent crafting with friends has aways got to be a great day and Sunday was no exception! 

Our ladies came to the workshop prepped ready for a day full of creating wonderful backgrounds and brooches.

So how did they get started?........

For this project we were using Tim Holtz Alcohol Inks and Yupo paper. Everyone experimented with different colour combinations of alcohol inks to create vivid and beautiful backgrounds. We supplied multiple sheets of Yupo so that they could create a choice of backgrounds to use later on their projects.

Once they had finished this initial stage we then showed them some techniques they could use with the Alcohol Lift Ink using stamps and stencils. This technique allowed them to lift areas of colour using stamped designs or patterns using the stencils.

The image above shows the effect of the Alcohol Lift Ink using a butterfly stamp. As you can see the ink has lifted the colour from the coloured background.

After playing around with these techniques, everyone had a great variety of backgrounds to choose from in the next stage of the day..... assembling their brooches.

They started by drawing around these MDF heart shapes which will form the base of their brooch. From there they could pick and choose from a multitude of ephemera and lace and also add tiny photos to their brooches too.

If they didn't want to wear what they had made, they also had the option to turn these hearts into hanging decorations using the pre-drilled holes in the hearts to thread through some ribbon.

Once they were happy with what they had designed the final stage was to add Inkssentials Glossy Accents to the surface which will set clear and glossy.

The final part of the workshop was creating a background for a photo frame using the alcohol ink backgrounds from before and adding some ephemera and washi tape to help frame the picture.

All in all a wonderful day and we look forward to hosting another workshop soon!

NEW WORKSHOP: Make yourself a beautiful brooch

A new workshop has finally arrived and this time the end result can be worn!

In our new workshop you will be making 2-3 mixed media brooches and one mixed media photo background that can be layered in a 6x4 inch photo frame.

To create these pieces we started off by having fun with some Tim Holtz alcohol inks on Yupo paper to make some wonderful designs. We picked colours that we knew we would be happy to wear as eventually we will be turning these creations into a background for a brooch. We experimented with the Alcohol Lift Ink to create some great effects on our backgrounds.

Once we were happy with the way our backgrounds were looking we traced around a heart shape MDF piece that is going to be the shape and backing of our brooch. Once the background had been cut to the right size we delved into our embellishment drawers and picked out some wonderful die cut  floral pieces, lace cut offs, gems and more!

We finally stuck everything in place using glossy accents and once it had all adhered the final stage was to cover the entire brooch with an even layer of glossy accents and then lay to dry.

End result - a beautiful handmade brooch!

Check out some close ups of our brooches below and also a closer look at the alcohol ink photo background we made for a frame.

To find out more details about this workshop, please click here.

Mixed Media Plexi Glass Collage Workshop

Hi everyone, we have a new workshop to announce today which is great for those mixed media lovers!

The workshop will involve making two mixed media collage pieces on 6 x 4.5 inch paper and these will be layered back to back to be displayed in a plexi glass frame. Each collage will use a variety of techniques using a range of products including Distress Oxide Re-inkers, texture paste, embossing powders and more! Each collage can be personalised with a photo or simply add in a Tim Holtz paper doll ephemera piece to add some character and fun.

More examples of some of the other collage pieces we have created can be seen below:-

As you can see from these examples, there is so much possibility to create a different design just by mixing up the colours or adding different ephemera pieces.

Once finished you will be able to display your creation at home and because the pieces are layered back to back you can change your choice of design on show as and when you feel like it!

For more information about booking a space please visit our Workshops page.