Turning a negative into a positive.

Hi everybody,

Jill here, and today, I'm being a little negative...

...but don't worry, it's all in the name of creating something pretty, by using the negative space from a die-cut!

I love a cool background and a statement sentiment to make up a card, so thought I would try this technique out to see if it was enough to stand on it's own.

I started by creating my background.  I inked up a piece of card using various Distress Inks, going form dark to light green, creating an ombre effect.  I wanted a kind of teal/turquoise colour, of which there are not nearly enough of yet (Come on Tim!), so went over the whole piece in a light blue to create my own colour.  I then inked up My Favourite Things 'Sketched Chevron' background stamp, (still one of my favourite ever background stamps, it very rarely leaves my craft table.  It's just so subtle, and pretty, and versatile.  Love it!), in the same ombre of inks, gave a very light spritz of water, and stamped onto my card.  I then added a few sploshes and splashes of water, and of some pearl and copper mica powder sprays I had made up, to add extra interest.

I knew I was going to need even dimension across my whole piece of card, so that the less supported areas didn't droop and distort, so I adhered a piece of of black foam sheet across the back of my entire piece, making sure to hit every area with glue so even my teeny pieces would stay intact once cut.  I then took Lawn Fawn's 'Scripty Cheers' die, and cut it from the upper centre of my card.  Once cut, I made sure to keep the piece in the card using a piece of low-tack tape, so everything stayed exactly where it should be.  

I then took another piece of card, slightly bigger than my main panel, and heat embossed, pretty much the whole thing, (that powder just goes on and on doesn't it?!) in this kind of copper/rose gold colour, paying extra attention to the edges and the area which would peek through my die-cut space.  I then put glue all over the back of my main panel, apart from the actual die-cut itself, and adhered to my embossed card.  Once in place, I carefully removed my 'Scripty Cheers' die-cut, leaving the negative space, and the wee little pieces, in place.  

I built up my sentiment to say a little more by heat embossing another stamp from my stash, onto vellum in the same powder, cutting into a little flag, and adhering to my card using a scattering of sequins I used to embellish with.  I mounted my whole piece onto a cream card blank, and that was that.

I really like how this turned out and am going to go back through my stash and see what else would work well.  So don't just look at your dies as the piece that actually cuts, think how many awesome designs you can get from the space it leaves behind, and turn your negative, into a positive :)

I hope you like it.  As always, everything I used is linked below so be sure to go have a quick snoop around the store!

See you next week.

Jillx