MAGPIE'S MUMBLINGS

A blog about my interests, which include fabric landscapes and various and assorted other artsy pursuits and sometimes known to contain mumblings of a random nature.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

brown blob you say?


I know, I know...it looks disgusting doesn't it. However, in my defence, the picture isn't doing it justice. On one of my groups this technique came up in conversation and, because a friend was here for the day, we thought we'd have a go.

It's a faux leather technique and surprisingly enough it looks quite authentic and SO easy to do. Here's what we did:
Layer 1 - a piece of scrap fabric (in this case I used a piece of muslin)
Layer 2 - torn bits of masking tape stuck down randomly all over the fabric (being sure to ultimately cover it all with tape). We decided at this point it would be wise to use a brayer to ensure all the tape was well adhered.
Layer 3 - we used a water base wood stain in Dark Walnut (Liquitex Acryclic Wood Stain) which we brushed on fairly thickly. We let it sit for about a minute before we blotted it with a sop cloth until it reached the look we wanted. (Initially I wiped the stain off, but the effect wasn't realistic enough so I reapplied the stain and blotted it off).
Layer 4 - after it dried, we used water base varnish to seal it.

Great fun, easy, and best of all...cheap, cheap, cheap!!
(Thanks Gail & Yvonne for the idea)

7 comments:

  1. great technique. I've seen it done with bonded tissue paper that's scrunched, but never masking tape before...

    ReplyDelete
  2. hmmmmm bookmarking this in techniques :}thanks sweets!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Nice idea. Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Could use it for a "leather" journal cover. ; )

    ReplyDelete
  5. Doesn't look disgusting to me in fact I thinks it's terrific

    ReplyDelete
  6. It does look like leather. You went a step further than I ever have. I always just covered glass bottles with the masking tape then put the stain on it to make it look like the leather. but this is even better as it can be used for many things. Great job.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I have a picture I should post that will match it for ugly and probably even beat it. It is a little hairy looking in the pic. When you see it it is really nice. I intend to put it on the front of a bag.

    The 2 pics I will post were 2 items I made the fabric on the embellisher then did a lot of extra hand embellishing on them.

    Maybe we have a little contest going on here.

    Hugs
    FredaB

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for leaving comments! I appreciate you taking the time out of your busy life to talk to me. It's wonderful to know that someone is actually reading my mumblings and even more fun if I can connect with you and visit your blog.