Top 10 2017 - 2017 in in review

2017 has been a different year, and a year of change for me. I started the year with writing for to magazines - Ett trykk and The papercrafting, and beeing on two amazing design teams for scrap book manifacturers - Kaisercraft and LDRS creative, and design team for Norways best craft shop (in my opinion) - Hobbykunst. 

Scandinavian Scrapbooker of the year 2016

I was also nominated for Scandinavian Scrapbooker og the year 2016 in March. I don't really like nominations like this, and there are a lot of reasons for that. One of them is that there are a lot of fantastic artists that will never be nominated for things like this. To be honest, this was a difficult nomination, as I was nominated with a few of my close friends. I really wanted my friends to win this. I was very happy to see that Susanne was the winner of this title. 

My top 10

Choosing top 10 was difficult, but I have chosen a few different creations. The first half of the year, I was crafting every day, as you really need to work hard, beeing on several design teams. I had several layouts at CHA for Kaisercraft, and a dress and cards at CHA for LDRS creative. I was published i the Kaisercraft magazines a few times over the year. I also had a few craft classes. 

The last half year, I have reduced the hours of crafting. There is a lot of personal reasons for this, and I am never really to personal when I write my blogposts or on social media. I have moved from one town to another, changed job and I am now getting settled. This is taking a lot of my time, and this is why I have reduced the number of hours used on crafting. I finished as a designer for Kaisercraft and writing for the magazine Ett trykk.  I will still write for the Papercrafting, and design for LDRS creative and Hobbykunst in 2018.

Prima dress 

This dress was created for the show "Design by me" for Hobbykunst

Prima dress

Treat bags

Treat bags created for the magazine The papercrafting.

Christmas treat bags

Layout - Every Picture has a story to tell

This layout was created for Kaisercraft with tutorial.

Every picture has a story to tell

Kaisercraft - dress

This dress was created as a part of the Design team call for Kaisercraft's design team 2017-2018.

Kaisercraft dress

Diamond fold Pirate card

This card was created for the magazine The Papercrafting with motive from LDRS creative and papers from Kaisercraft.

Diamond fold card

Wooden sign

This sign was created, using a hand made stencil, created with a Silhouette machine. This was created for the magazine " The Papercrafting"

Wooden sign

Mixed media class - Mixed media trowel with patina

This is a mixed media class I had in Northern Norway last spring.

Mixed media trowel with patina effect

Prima globe

This spring, a lot of people created globes. I created a globe for Hobbykunst, using one of their acrylic ornaments and Prima papers.

Prima globe

Mixed media canvas

This canvas was created for Kaisercraft.

Mixed media canvas

Hello spring - Layout



This layout was created for Kaisercraft with instructions for their blog.
Hello spring layout



Wishing you a Happy New Year

A paper dress with Prima's St. Tropez collection

From the 22 to the 24th of Septmber, there was a large craft convention in Oslo. I was working on Hobbykunst's stand this weekend. Before the convention, I was asked to create a paper dress from an old styrophone dress form. I had already desided I wanted to create a dress with one of Prima's new collections. The problem, wanting new collections, is waiting for them to get to the shop.

I sorted out the dress form. Covered the dress form with lace, and glued it to the dressform with Finnabair's sculpture medium. After the medium had dried, I painted the dressform with Finnabair's gesso. I used an old, large candlestick as a base for the dress form. The dressform was now about a meter tall. 

I decided I wanted to create the dress with Prima's St. Tropez collection. I thought the Sainte Maxime paper was super for a dress.

The stand at Design by me, with the paper dress at the front.

The skirt has been created over an underskirt. I added a crinoline over the underskirt, to mount the ruffles - flounces. The skirt has been created with  Prima's Sainte Maxime paper - St. Tropez and black cardstock. 

The flowers used are Prima flowers from the Love Clippings collection: All Of Me Loves All Of You and Forever & Always.

The top of the black skirt has lots and lots of feathers, created with Rayher's feather dies.

The top band on the dress has been created with paper triangles, sawn together.

Enjoy :) 

2017/18 Kaisercraft Design Team Application

It is the time for a new application for Kaisercraft's design team. I have been on the team for two years, and it has been two fantastic years working with fantastic quality papers and so many sweet collections. 

Kaisercraft's design team application is in two rounds. Those who are chosen to go on to the second round, get a box from Kaisercraft with a collection to use for the second round. The task was to create something with a WOW factor, showing my style. So this is just what I did. I created a paper summer dress with lots of ruffles and flowers.

Why I created a paper dress

I do a lot of different paper crafts. I love doing cards, layouts, mixed media - but most of all, I enjoy creating advanced altered and 3D projects. I have created a few paper dresses before, and I have enjoyed that. I love to get the paper to fold into ruffles, just where I want them to. 

Most of all, I get my inspiration to create from the collections I work with. I decided to wait to see what kind of paper collection I got to work with, before I decided what to create for the second round. The box arrived, and the paper collection was the Lilac Whisper with collectables, corrougated cardstock, coloured cardstock, flowers, Blossom stensil, and wooden Flourish Pack (Bouquet).

When I found out that the paper collection I had to work with for the final Kaisercraft round was the super sweet Lilac Whisper collection, I knew that I had to make a summer dress. The colours, flowers and patterns in the lilac papers inspired me. I also decided that I wanted to use the box itself. I used the box to create the circular base for the dress.

The process of creating the dress and the skirt and the ruffles:

The process of creating dresses like these are like you would create a usual dress with ruffles. It is part of the education in a side step of the tailor education, but I will go through the main process.

First I started with the doll. This is a Barbie doll, and I created the pattern for the skirt, using copy paper. At the end, the skirt was dismantled and created in papers from the Lilac Whisper collection. 

The first part was to create the main underskirt. The ruffles need to be fixed to a crinoline or another underskirt. I often create a crinoline for this, but this time, I wanted a dress with a long skirt at the back, so I decided to create a cape / underskirt for this. 

The underskirts were taped together , ready for the ruffles.

Ruffles for a dress like this need to be individually created, to make them come to a mountain fold and a valley fold, just where you want them to. This was done adding triangles to the ruffle, where I wanted a mountain fold and taking triangles out where I wanted a valley fold.

After creating the first set of ruffles with lots of tape and triangles added and taken out, it was traced onto copy¨paper. A new set of ruffle pattern was created, without all the tape. The ruffle was more curled at the back of the skirt. This is due to the shape of the dress at the back. This will increase the amount of ruffles at the back. The strip of paper creating the ruffle, is long and curly, and needed to be created in several steps and glued together.

The ruffles were added to the underskirt. As they were added, it started to curl as the paper is bending and glued onto the underskirt.

All the layers of ruffles, had to be individually made. This can be seen in the next layer, being a different shape.

The next layer of ruffles were added to the dress. As the next layer were added, it started to fold, trying to keep the mountain and valley folds over each other in most places. 

All the layers added. The pattern of the skirt was finished.

The skirt was dismantled, layer by layer, and used as a pattern for the skirt in the Lilac Whisper paper collection. The underskirt was made from white cardstock. I only used the lilac papers for the dress itself. Starting with the darkest paper at the bottom of the dress, and ligher colours above. 

The Lilac summer dress

The doll used for the dress, is a barbie doll. 

The underskirt is made from white cardstock. To create some pattern on the base, I used the Blossom template and gesso. 

At the bottom ruffle, I used the reverse side of the Echo paper. Then I used the papers in this order: Illusion, Opal, Illusion (reverse) and Well Wishes. 

I added hand made flowers, Kaisercraft flowers, flowers from the Lilac Whisper collectables, wooden flourishes - leaves and flowers and diesed leaves. 

You can see a short tutorial, for creating the larger white 3D flower with Kaisercraft dies, at the bottom of this blogpost. 

The base has been made out of the card board box, that the papers and embellishments arrived in. The base has been covered with the paper Mauve (reverse).

Kaisercraft products: Lilac Whisper collection: P2342 Hydrangea | P2344 Mauve | P2345 Illusion | P2346 Opal | P2350 Echo | P2351 Well Wishes | CT885 Collectables | FL604 Bouquet Flourish Pack | IT017 Blossom | F643 Amethyst Paper Bloom | F630 Iceberg Paper Blooms | F647 Sage Mini Paper Blooms | DD359 Decorative Die Gum Nuts  | DD707 Decorative Die Layerd Flowers | DD373 Decorative Die Pancy Flowers | CD101 Coconut Weave cardstock | CD160 Pistachio Cardstock Weave | SB705 Rhinestone Lilac.

Other: Gesso

Flower Tutorial:

I have created flowers for this dress in several ways. One of the flowers is a large white flowers at the back of the dress. This has been created using the Layerd Flowers Decorative Die (DD707) and   Pancy Flowers Decorative Die (DD373) and white cardstock. This is how I created the flower. I have used the Lilac Whisper collection against the white background.

Hope you enjoyed this.