Butterflies and Sparkles – Paper ArtBoard

Hey everyone, Gemma Hynes here today with a cool paper Artboard based project.
Here in the UK we have been having the most lovely sunny weather with beautiful blue skies, and I have been spending my days reading to my son in the flower garden near my home.

The beautiful colours in the sky and the pretty flowers I have been surrounded by inspired me to make this butterfly and flower Paper ArtBoard that is covered in lots of Glimmer Mists so it has lots of sparkle and shine.

Products used in this project:
Architextures Mixed Media Artboard
Tattered Angels- Glimmer Mist- Coffee Shop, Verdigris, Dragonfly, Dazzling Diamonds, English Ivy, Gold, Fully Purple
Tattered Angels – High Impact Paint – Blue, White, Yellow
Gesso, Polkadoodles flower stamps, Stencils
Black Calligraphy Pen, Paint Brushes
Transfer paper, embossing tool

I did not prepare the board in anyway, I just sprayed over the top with a mixture of three Glimmer Mists, keeping the colours similar as I knew I wanted the background to remind me of a very blue sky.

Next, I build up my background by spraying the darker blue I used in the first step over the top through a large stencil.

Then I continued spraying Glimmer Mist through a stencil but this time I used the Gold Glimmer Mist. This allowed me to introduce a darker colour to my canvas without it being to bold as it appears darker than it is over the blues underneath. I also love how when I sprayed the gold through the stencil it pushed the Mists underneath out, giving the circles a dark blue ring. It was such a happy accident that I really hope I can replicate.

To finish off my background I sprayed a little Glimmer Mist on to my mat and used the lid to add circles all over the canvas board.

After I found the text I wanted to use, I planned out the size, spacing and font I wanted on my laptop and printed it off. I then transferred the text to the canvas board with some transfer paper and an embossing tool.

I then traced over the top with a calligraphy pen. This takes a little bit of time but If you are like me and really dislike or feel uncomfortable with you handwriting it allows you still add any text you would like to a project and gives it that handwritten feel.

I then stamped out my flowers and butterfly’s. When I wanted to use an image in reverse on the canvas, I stamped it out onto a piece of card and used transfer paper and an embossing tool to transfer the images to the canvas.

Once everything was stamped/drawn out I started to paint them with a mixture of different High Impact paints and Glimmer mists, I did this in layers as the products I was using where fairly translucent.

After the first layer of paint went down I started to add white paint and gesso to increase the opacity of the mixtures I was using. Once everything was completely dry I went around all the images with a black pen, drawing in the stems and ant details that had missed earlier.

You’re done! A beautiful blue board to remind you of the clear sunny summer skies!

Happy crafting!

Gemma Hynes
blog and Instagram

Sign up to Receive Inspiring Content, Exclusive Offers and More!

Your information will *never* be shared or sold to a 3rd party.