DecoArt Goes Zakka! Part One

Good morning, dear readers, followers and crafting friends!

I recently decided to take out my sewing machine and try something textile. I also wanted to experiment a little with the fabulous DecoArt so-soft fabric paints and do something else than simply paint with them.

Which in the end lead to some semi-controlled sewing and messing with paints ;)
As I am more the woodworks girl (having taught wood works at school for almost twenty years), my approach to sewing honestly resembles to building up boxes - only from fabric instead of wood *lol.

So if you are on the hunt for a sewing tutorial that works without measuring, using tailor's chalk or complicated seams, this is the right place for you ;)

The result of my messing around was this - a pocket for my mobile phone:

I started with some stamping on fabric which was great fun.

Materials used:


- DecoArt So Soft fabric paints
- fabric ribbons
- clear stamps and stamping   bloc
- cut off pieces of kitchen sponge
- a piece of acetate (from packaging material)
- baby wipes
- scissors







1. I cut various strips of ribbon to desired length. (Actually I cut them about twice and a half times the length of my mobile phone as I had not decided which parts of the ribbon I would use  for my pocket later - and I could use scraps of the stamped ribbons for other projects too for some fabric embellishments).

2. Mount your desired stamp to the acrylic bloc and get acetate sheet, kitchen sponge and fabric paint ready. I started with DecoArt So Soft "Dioxazine Purple".

3. Pour a tiny amount of colour onto the acetate.

4. Spread it (a bit larger than the size of the image you want to stamp) using the piece of kitchen sponge  by dabbing it softly.

5. Gently dip the stamp into the colour several times to cover the stamp. Don't press too hard - otherwise you will squish the colour out on the sides.

6. Stamp. Repeat steps 5 and 6 until you want to change to the next colour.

7. I chose DecoArt So Soft "Crimson" next and added it directly onto the Dioxazine Purple.

8. Spread again and stamp the same way as before.

9. For another tone add a third colour. I chose DecoArt So Soft "Indian Turquoise" (which mixed to a light lilac with the red underneath).

10. Clean stamps and acetate using a baby wipe or damp cloth. Rinse the kitchen sponge with clear water.

11. Let dry - about 48 hours (or speed up the drying process using the heat tool - which works perfectly for impatient folk like me. But be careful - if you didn't stamp on pure linen or cotton fabric your ribbons might crumple from the heat!)

That's it so far with stamping the ribbons.
Next I played around with applying colour to fabric by using a brayer.

  Materials used:

- DecoArt So Soft fabric paints
- a brayer
- a piece of acetate
- a piece of single coloured fabric (mine was linen)
- baby wipes







1. Apply some droplets of fabric colour onto the acetate. Try to vary in size and distance inbetween. I used DecoArt So Soft colours "Dioxazine Purple", "Crimson", "Indian Turquoise" and "Canary Yellow". It is totally up to you in which order you use them. But only one colour at a time.

2. Take up some of the colour with your brayer and roll it over the fabric. It will leave various colour traces and by layering them you can add a lot of interest and texture to your fabric.

Clean the brayer and the acetate using a baby wipe between repeating the process with different colours. Let dry for 48 hours before washing.

Voila:

In Part Two I will show you how to arrange your ribbons and some stencilling on the prepared fabric and how to sew the sleeve for your mobile phone without using a measuring tape. In the meantime: have fun producing brayered fabric and stamping your own customized fabric ribbons!

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia xx