Thursday 5 January 2017

A Fossil Cabinet for a Young Explorer

Hi, servus and welcome to my first post for 2017!
I hope you have all had fantastic holidays and a wonderful new year's eve! May the new year bring you loads of joy, fun and success on your creative endeavours!

I am kicking off the new year with a make from last year - but one that I can only now finally share as it was a gift that has now been delivered to a wonderful young man I had the chance to get to know when visiting my friend Laura and her lovely family in the UK two years ago. I know that he loves red pens and collecting stones and fossils (like I do too) - so I made a fossil cabinet for him.




This is just a detail from one of the cabinet's sides. I used one of the fab TCW stencils, DecoArt media Modeling Paste and Texture Sand Paste and loads of DecoArt paints to create the look of fossils being embedded in stone (well - at least I tried to).




The cabinet came as a blank white cardboard box and I started with dabbing the DecoArt Texture Sand Paste onto the box using my fingers. That was followed by adding the fossil fish and trilobite shapes using TCW stencils, a palette knife and DecoArt media white Modelling Paste. Once all was dry I added a thorough coat of Raw Umber as a base to work on. Once that had dried I went in with various DecoArt Americana paints - dry brushing and painting them on as needed.




DecoArt Metallic Lustres were added to the raised areas of the fossil shapes to imitate a bit of a sheen
where the fossils had been "polished" by wind and weather over the ages.






The last step was to paint on the marbled look - using a fine tip brush...




...and to add an old map from an old dictionary to the back, toning it down with a wash of DecoArt paints to make it match the whole design of my cabinet.




I just love the effect of the Texture Sand Paste, contrasting the shiny fossils!






I had a lot of fun creating this little keepsake for a young explorer! And I hope he likes his cabinet!!!



Thanks for stopping by! I hope you enjoyed your visit!

Hugs and happy crafting!
Claudia
xxx

11 comments:

  1. Hi Claudia, love this cabinet, and the colours used...looks you had so much fun! Happy New Year...

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  2. Wow!! Love the fossils, must find that stencil. The colours are gorgeous with all that lovely texture. Congrats on the DT post, well deserved.

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  3. Sehr schön. Ich glaube die Schablone brauche ich auch.Ich steh auf diese Fisch Skelette....xx

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  4. huhu Claudia, ein gesundes Neues für dich und deine Lieben !!!!
    Ein wundervolles Projekt das bestimmt super gut angekommen ist *ganzsicherbin
    LG hellerlittle

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  5. It's fabulous.

    I'm sure he will love and treasure it.

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  6. Happy new year Claudia! You start with an original and wonderful gift for this passionate young man... great design, amazing colours and textures!

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  7. What an AMAZING creation Claudia!! Love it so much!!

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  8. What a nice gift! It is wonderful!

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  9. Excellent make Claudia! I would love one myself!
    hugs,Jackie

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Thank you so much for your visit and especially for taking the time to leave me a short comment! This is highly appreciated! xxx