Art Recipe: Book in Pastels and Gold

Hi again my darlings!
I got back home from the fabulous Craft Hobby and Stitch in Birmingham and I'm back here on the blog to send you my weekly portion of creative inspiration in Art Recipe!
It was really mad couple of days (again!) and I'm deeply grateful to all of you who dropped to say hi or watch my demo at Notions Marketing booth during the show. It's such a pleasure to see you all! :)

Before the show there was one super important event - our first ever UK Mixed-Media Day opened to retailers, educators and teachers. Our small team was so excited to meet this crazy talented group and I'm so happy to share the whole idea seems to be a great success! (You can check photos from that day on my Instagram - we were very busy, but had loads of fun too!)
My job was of course teaching the class and explaining my new Prima Mixed-Media Line in action - and part o the project we did on that day is a journal cover similar to the one I'm showing you today!
(You can feel like taking small part of the class - how cool is this?).

First - let me show you the final effect - mixed-media journal cover in pastels and with a touch of metallic finishing!

Working on this one I wanted to focus on nice textures in the background, created with one of my Doily Stencils and the cluster of embellishments in the middle of the cover. Colors were added later, as usual!

I've used Prima Color Bloom Sprays in shades of blue and gold, diluted a bit with water sprayed on the top. Final touches were done with my new secret weapon: Art Ingredients Mica Powders!

Full art recipe for this cover is listed below - check it out!

And here is what I did to alter my chipboard cover:

1. I started with removing my cover from the wire - as the wire is soft and easy to bend you don't need any tools to do that! Next I wrapped some masking tape around my elastic for protection and applied a coat of Art Basics Modeling Paste through a stencil to create interesting texture. I dried it with heating tool and took out embellishments I wanted to use for this project: mix of Mechanicals, paper flowers and buttons. Some of my elements were painted already - it didn't matter!

2. Using the same Modeling Paste (Art Basics Pastes and Gels are great adhesives!) I glued all my elements in the desired places to create nice looking cluster. I dried the project again and covered all my embellishments and both chipboard journal covers with a coat of Art Basics White Heavy Gesso. After drying I repeated the step in selected places - some of the embellishments were really dark and harder to repaint!

3. Whem gesso was dry I picked couple of colors from Prima Color Bloom range and sprayed both of my covers. To make the colors more pastel and delicate I sprayed some water on the top to wash off the colors when they were getting too strong. When I was happy with the result I dried the covers with the heating tool.

4. In the last step I mixed a bit of Art Basics Soft Gloss Gel with Art Ingredients Mica Powder (Gold) - by simply dabbing a bit of Soft Gel on the mat and mixing in some mica. This way I've created some custom made metallic gold paint which was very sticky and great for dry brushing to accent the details of my embellishments! It's permanent after drying too!

In a couple of minutes my project was ready- with beautiful, vintage-looking metallic highlights. How simple is that?

For your convenience I've made this list of the products used based on the stock of Mixed Media Place Online Store! Here they are: 

You think you can handle more? I've got one more cover for you - the technique is very similar, but this time you can see a touch of Art Ingredients Glitter!

And again - some details:

I hope I gave you some ideas and creative fluids are flowing now!
I will see you very soon again on the weekend - but check the blog on Friday too to see fabulous tutorial made just for you by one of my CT Members!

Sending warmest hugs to all of you

P.S. - Have you heard the news? My new products are arriving to Mixed Media Place today! Catch them before it's too late!