Fancy making your festive decorations this year? 10 minutes with google and a handful of words like ‘handmade’, ‘paper’, ‘unique’ etc and you’ll be awash with ideas. But some of the DIY guides online are a lot trickier than they first appear – I know this because every Christmas get an overwhelming urge to make a new, more elaborate christmas decoration, and I go in search of instruction. If you are not confronted with a confusing and expensive looking ‘essential equipment’ list, you are covered in sticky glue within half an hour!

So here’s a quick, simple, clean and very effective little decoration I came across a while ago. It can be strung on thread and hung on your tree, or attached to ribbon and used to liven up your wrapped parcels. Perfect for last minute decorating.

You will need:

Scissors

A ruler

A glue stick

A stapler

A sheet of wrapping or coloured paper, A4 or larger. I have used sheet music, which has a nice vintage feel to it.

Cut at least 8 strips of paper, about one inch wide and at least 8 inches long.

Lay all the strips on top of each other. If you are using paper with a white side, lay all the strips with the white side facing upwards.

You should now have a stack of paper strips. Fold the whole stack in half, so you can find the central point in the paper strips. Staple all the strips together at this central point.

Now, apply a small stripe of glue to the end of one of your paper strips and bend the strip towards the centre. press down so that the paper strip stays bent into a loop. Repeat with every strip, tucking them one behind the other, so that you start to get a flower shape.

Once all the paper strips are stuck down, you’re done! See, very simple but effective.

Merry Christmas!

Rosie

This Make-at-Home is inspired by The Gallery’s current exhibition, Trace, and by the forthcoming workshop Josie and I will be running at Artison, titled Jewellery: Inspired by Vintage.

The paper flower in this blog is simple, quick and best of all, can be made from all sorts of papers (including vintage ones!). I have adapted the original instructions I had, to make the paper flower into a unique ring, which takes less than 30 minutes to make, and can be made almost entirely out of recycled bits and pieces.

You will need:

paper – for each ring, you need 5 squares of equal size. I have made quite an extravagantly large ring, and the paper I used was about 5cm square. Bear in mind, the smaller the paper, the more fiddly the job!

Wire – basic jewellery wire to make the ring. about 0.5mm thickness will be fine.

A bead or button – not too big.

scissors

glue/double-sided tape

Step one – take one of your paper squares and fold in half diagonally to make a triangle. Then, fold up the two base corners of the triangle towards the peak of the triangle (see image two) to make a square.

Once you have done this, fold the same two points down, so that the folded edge will lie exactly on top of the edge of the square. Then, open up the little flaps you have just made, and flatten them (image 3).

Fold down the top triangular point of each of the flattened flaps. Fold the flattened flaps inwards (image 2 below)

.Using either glue or double-sided tape (for less mess), roll the two folded flaps towards each other, and stick them together down the middle. You should end up with a little paper florets with a few folds of paper inside (3rd image below)

Make four more of these!

Once you have made all five florets,start sticking them together. Apply a stripe of glue/tape down the side of each florets and glue to the next florets in the same place. Keep going until all five are stuck together (they should naturally be forming a flower shape as they are glued) then glue to two end florets together.

That’s the paper flower done! Now to make it into a ring…

Take a length of wire – 6 inches will be more than enough, and thread your chosen bead/button into the middle of the length, then give the two tails of wire a twist together so that the bead stays in place.

Thread the two tails of wire through the centre of the paper flower, so that the bead sits in the little hole in the middle of the paper florets.

If you are making this ring for yourself, divid the two tails of wire, and wrap on around your finger clockwise, the other anti-clockwise, until there is only about 1cm of wire left. If you’re making this for someone else, use a wooden hand mannequin, or the recipient’s hand, so you can get the size right!

To finish off, twist the last 1cm of wire around the side of the ring of wire, and tuck the very end into a gap in the ring, or back up into the paper flower.

All done! For a more professional looking ring, you could always solder the end of the wire to neaten them up…

Thats all from me if you enjoyed this project, then Jewellery, Inspired by Vintage on september 17th, will be right up your street! We’ll be showing you how to make professional looking pieces of jewellery using recycled and vintage materials and objects. To book or for more information, click here.

Rosie

Welcome back to Make At Home with Masham Gallery! I recently tutored a workshop on handmade cards, tags and wrapping ideas up at ArtisOn, and  I wanted to share one of the favourite creative projects I discovered. Considerable thanks has to go to Hester Cox printmaker extraordinaire for this who 1st used it in her block printing workshop. This must be the quickest, cheapest and easiest way of giving your pressies and personalised yet professional finish, it’s my new favourite hobby and I’m pretty sure everyone who reads this will love it too…

You will need:

Fun Foam – thin sheets of craft foam, large packs available for about £1 in most shops that have an ‘Craft’ section (the works, WH Smiths, supermarkets etc).

Printing Blocks – These can be any old off-cuts of wood, or you can treat yourself (for a very small fee) to some properly finished ones from York based/online stamp shop Make Your Mark.

Ink Pads – Also available in a variety of colours from Make Your Mark, or most art supply shops

Scissors – these are origami scissors, which are available in most good craft shops. They’re not essential, but are really useful for cutting intricate patterns.

Craft knife/Scalpel – I use scalpels, which are sharper and great of intricate cutting, but they are more expensive, harder to get hold of (Swann Morton make the best, they are available from some art supply shops) and VERY sharp, so not good for children to use. Craft knives are cheaper and easier to use and are available from craft shops.

PVA glue

Tissue paper, lining paper, newsprint…whatever you want to print on!

Cut out a square of foam that matches the size of your printing block, and draw out your design. You will need to turn the foam around once it is cut, so write any letters backwards!

As well as cutting the shapes, pressing into the foam with a ball-point pen will also create indentations which will be picked up by the ink – perfect for adding small details.

Using your craft knife (and a cutting mat or thick surface which you don’t mind cutting into), cut out your design.

Turn your design round. The reason for doing this is as you have drawn and cut onto the foam, you will have pressed the edges down around the shapes you’ve cut, so ink may not pick up the edges of your shapes if you print from that side.

Cover the whole side of your printing block in a thin layer of PVA glue. This will keep the block more water-resistant and make it easier to clean – you may want to cover the whole block in glue once this side is dry.

Arrange your foam pieces on the block and allow to dry completely.

Once dry, you can ink up the block and start stamping! The foam stamps seem to last for ages, but if you get bored of the design and want to re-use the block you can always peel off the foam and start again.

And thats it – beautiful, original wrapping paper that you can make again and again.

I hope you enjoy this Make-At-Home. If you are interested in expanding your creative skills further and would like to attend an ArtisOn workshop, why not visit their website and check out the 2011 program? Hester Cox also expands this technique and others in this workshop.

See you soon!

Rosie

Hi!

While researching my last workshop at ArtisOn, which was all about making jewellery from recycled materials, I hit upon this simple but very effective way of making beads from paper. It’s very quick and the best part is you can use almost any paper, old wrapping paper (which is what I’ve used here) is perfect! And from this you can create beautiful and unique pieces of jewellery for next to nothing. Heres what you need…

paper – preferably decorative or coloured, and not too thin. Try some of this wrapping paper, from the square card company..

Glue – PVA, or a glue stick to limit mess.

Two paintbrushes  - one for applying glue, and another for making the beads. One of these brushes needs to have a fairly thin handle, so the hole in the beads doesn’t end up too big.

And scissors.

Cut your wrapping paper into strips.  Each strip needs to be at least 6 inches long to make the bead secure enough, but the width is up to you. The wider the strip, the longer the bead will be, but very narrow strips will be fiddly to wind into beads. The strips I have cut here are about 2cm wide.

Taking your thin paintbrush, place the edge of the strip of paper about 1cm away from the non-brush end, and start winding the strip around the brush.

It’s really important to keep the winded paper really tight, otherwise the bead won’t be strong and will look pretty messy.

When you get towards the end of your paper strip, apply a small coverage to the last 1cm of exposed paper, on the side that will be wound into the bead, then wind this over too, smoothing it out and wiping away any excess glue that splurges out.

Leave the bead on the brush for a minute to allow the glue to harden slightly, then gently but firmly push the bead off the end of the brush.

The first bead you do may take a few attempts to get right, but soon you will get into a good rhythm and make loads in no time at all! (tip; cut lots of strips of paper first before you start making the beads, otherwise it really will take you ages!)

To make the beads stronger, cover them with another thin layer of glue and allow to dry.

And there you have it! You now have a sustainable source of beads with which to make oodles of unique jewellery!

If you are inspired by this project, ArtisOn are running a handmade bead workshop on the 4th of June this year (tutored by myself and local ceramisist Charlotte Morrison), where we will be experimenting with a wide variety of materials to create unique and beautiful beads. Places are still available…

See you soon,

Rosie

Its been a while since I last did a project on our Make-At-Home blog, but I don’t want you to think I’ve forgotten! Last week Josie and I ran a fun workshop at ArtisOn, all about making jewellery from recycled and found objects. During the course of the day, we packed in plenty of exciting creative projects, and everyone who attended went home with at least 3 finished pieces of work – impressive considering all the tea & cake breaks!

One of our attendees, Kathryn Sharman, writes a wonderful blog Katgotthecream , so to find out more about our workshop and to see what we made, take a look. For more information on ArtisOn’s range of workshops click here.

But I’ getting off the point…during the workshop, one of the areas of jewellery making that people were most interested in (and confused by!) were the findings. For those of you who don’t know, jewellery findings and the various bits and bobs needed to attach beads, clasps and fastenings to jewellery, and generally give it a professional finish. There are a lot of findings to choose from, and each one has a different name and use. As I have discovered (on many an occasion!), without knowing the name of what you are looking for, getting hold of the right thing can be pretty tricky! So, here’s a brief introduction to basic jewellery findings…

Basic Jewellery Findings

Lobster Clasps

These are a very common fastening for necklaces, and are easy to attach using jump rings (see below)

Jump Rings

Jump rings are tiny pieces of metal, roughly bent round into a circle. They are perfect for attaching something to something else, e.g, a lobster clasp to a chain, or a charm to a bracelet. You will need a pair of flat-nosed pliers to close jump rings.

Split Rings

Split rings are slightly more secure than jump rings, but basically have the same use. Split rings come closed, and need to be opened gently with pliers before use. They are easier to close however as they have a neater circular shape.

Ribbon Crimps

There are lots of different ‘crimps’ available, but ribbon crimps are my favourite as they are professional looking, secure, and easy to use. Crimps securely finish the ends of a necklace or bracelet, and allow a fastening to be attached. Ribbon crimps trap the ribbon or cord between two flaps of metal, and finish with a small hole for a split or jump ring to be attached to.

Head Pins

Head pins are particularly essential for earring making, or if you want to create dangly strands on necklace. They are a bendy piece of wire, with a pin-like head, which stops beads falling off. The other end of the head pin can be bent with pliers to create a loop, which can then be hooked onto something else.

Flat Nosed Pliers

Flat nosed pliers make applying findings much easier. They are particularly useful for applying crimps and closing split/jump rings.

I hope this has been useful, and that it inspires you to create some of your own amazing jewellery. All these items are available in craft shops, and Ebay, they’ll be a good start for making basic bits of jewellery.

See you soon with more inspiring ideas!

Rosie

Hello and welcome back to our Make-at-ome blog. Its been a while , as we’ve been off organising exhibitions amongst other things, all of which you can catch up on in our Masham Gallery blog.

As some of you may know by now, The Gallery’s owner Josie is one of the 4 founders of Masham’s newest arty venture, ArtisOn (www.artison.co.uk) , a permanent art course venue. Based just outside of Masham at High Burton, ArtisOn is a haven of arty and craftyness, where anyone looking to develop their creative skills will feel right at home. As well as being the new home of The Gallery’s exsisting art course programme (Ian Scott Massie art courses) ArtisOn will host day courses from a range of experienced artists and practitioners in a variety of disciplines including Printmaking, Stone Carving, Weaving, Collage, Jewellery Making and Ceramics. Beginners or more experienced folk are welcome.

To give you a little taster of what to expect from ArtisOn, this edition of Make @ Home is all about my specialist subject, Recycled collage. More specifially, recycled greetings cards, a subject on which I will be running a course at ArtisOn next year (keep checking out the website for more details).

Recycled collage is a great way of producing totally unique artwork without having to buy loads of expensive materials. Its all about working with what you have, experimenting with different bits and pieces and seeing what happens. In this demo I will be using old postcards, text from old books, buttons and postage stamps.Simple!

For this project you will need:

An old postcard

Two different types of scrap paper – I’ve used one with text and one with a simple pattern

Scissors

Glue – I have used PVA and a glue stick – both are useful in different ways, but you can use either, or both!

A brown A5 envelope (used or new) and a sheet of thin card OR a sheet of brown card (this is harder to come by, which is why I will be showing you an alternative with the envelope.)

Buttons (the flatter the better!)

A few old postage stamps

Step One:

You need to make your flowers, so draw out 3 flower shapes each on the underside of both your scrap papers. To fit on the postcard, the flowers need to be about 3cm wide, but its up to you. When drawing them, don’t worry too much about making them perfect and all the same – I find they look better when they’re a bit odd (as you will see mine certainly are). A little imperfection also gives the card a unique, handmade feel.

Arrange the flowers on your postcard. For mine, I have layered the contrasting papers to create 3 flowers – but again this is up to you. Here are a few different things you could do…

Step Two:

Once you’ve decided how to arrange your flowers, glue them onto the postcard. You can use either glue stick or PVA for this. Don’t cover the paper flowers with glue, just put a little blob in the centre of the flower – that way the petals stick out nicely making it a bit 3D!

Step three…once the flowers are attached to your postcard, and the glue is dry, its time to pick the buttons which are going to form the centre of your flower. The reason these need to be flat is because they are going to be glued to the paper. However, if you are feeling particularly creative you could always stitch them on!

Pick some buttons that work well with the colours in you card – test out a few combinations.Once you have got the perfect ones, apply a blob of glue to the backs of them and glue them carefully in place. (If using PVA, don’t worry if you get some in the wrong places, or if the glue comes through the centre of the button, as it will dry clear.)

Step four:

Your flowers are done – hurrah! Now its time to make your leaves – you can make as few or many as you like of these, they just add a nice bit of detail and are good for filling some of the blank bits on the card. Using scissors, cut simple leaf shapes from your postage stamps (or any other paper you may like to use). To make them the same size as mine, you should be able to get two from one standard-sized stamp.

…arrange the leaves on your postcard wherever and however you like. I’ve done them like this…

Glue your leaves down. Using a glue stick will be easier and less messy than PVA.

Step five:

The decorations are all done. Now you need to make the actual card. I have used brown for the background as it works well with the colours. If you have some thin card the colour you would like to use, all you need to do is this:

Cut the card down so it is a maximum of A4 size (the size of a normal piece of office paper). Fold the card horizontally so you a have a crease through the middle, then lay it flat again. Place your postcard on the flat card, so that the top f the postcard is about 2cm from the central crease you have made.

Glue the postcard to the card in this place. cover the back of the postcard with glue, but be careful not to use too much as may be messy. Use a gue stick for this part if you have one.

Once the glue is dry and the postcard is secure, fold the card in half along the crease you made earlier.Keeping the card folded, cut it so there is a equal border of it all the way around the postcard.

If you do not have a piece of brown card (as I didn’t), you can always make some using an old envelope and some white office card.

Simply cut along the edge of the envelope to open it out

Glue the underside of the envelope (if its a used envelope, glue the side with writing on)

Now just glue this to your office card, and once its dry, follow step five above.

And voila! You should now have a complete card! If you feel the border around the postcard is too big, cut it smaller, but remember to fold the card as you cut it so that the front and back are an equal size.

I hope you have enjoyed this Make-At-Home and that it has inspired you to experiment with your own recycled cards. For more information the ArtisOn art and craft courses, please visit the website.

See you next time!

Rosie x

Part of the point of the project was to encourage Londoners to be more aware of their surroundings and notice the tiny details that make up their local area or journey to work, but the images and their titles also reflect the anonymity and loneliness of living in a large city.  The subject matter, which is often slightly rude or sinister, comments humorously on how little we know about what’s really going on in the world around us.

Slinkachu’s work has become iconic and many of his images can be found on badges and limited edition prints. His book ‘Little People in City” which catalogues this project is widely available.

But here at The Gallery we like to give our blogs a personal touch, so instead of just telling you about Slinkachu we decided to have a go at re-creating his style ourselves. Having located some of the “Little People” on Ebay we set about the shop floor with a camera and came up with these….

Not bad? Ok, so they’re not QUITE as good as Slinkachu’s, but they were certainly fun to do!

Don’t forget, this month The Gallery opens its first show of 2010, ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’, featuring the work of Josie Beszant, Rosie Scott Massie, John Degnan, Pamela Knight, Rachel Stainsby and Mary Farnell. The exhibition opens on the 20^th with the preview evening 7.30 – 9.30pm on the 19^th of March. We look forward to seeing you there!

Paper Lantern String

Perfect for hanging across the window or on the banister – our paper lantern string is a quick and easy project for young and old alike and will give your home a festive feel in minutes!

You will need:

Paper – preferably good quality, thick, and colourful. Obviously the more festive the paper the more Christmassy the overall result! Each lantern uses a quarter piece of A4, so to make a decent string you will need about 3-4 pieces of A4 cut into 4s.

Glue – the less messy the better – a glue stick is ideal – however sticky tape is not out of the question but may require some precise cutting!

Ribbon – any colour you like, the thinner the better (for threading). About 3 metres

Step One:

Take one of your pieces of paper and cut a strip of about 1 centimetre thickness off it from the longer side. This will be your lantern’s handle.

Take the rest of the paper and fold in half lengthways. Using scissors, cut into the folded side making cuts about 2 thirds the length of the paper strip. Continue right along the length of paper until it resembles a fringe! Repeat these 2 steps with all your bits of paper – it shouldn’t take you too long…

Now, open the folded pieces of paper – if you’ve cut the right side you will now have slits all across the middle section of the paper. If you’ve cut the wrong side you will now have two frilly edges.Oops.

Apply glue or sticky tape to the areas shown, and glue to their opposite corners, making a cylinder of paper.

Take your strips of paper and apply a spot of glue to each end. Glue to one of the open ends of the paper cylinder to make a handy handle.

Your lanterns are finished! Don’t they look great? Now you just need to string them, and it couldn’t be easier …

Thread the lanterns one by one onto the string and secure by tying a double knot around the handle. See, I said it was easy. Tie a loop in each end of the string when you’ve finished for easy hanging.

There you have it! A quick and simple Christmas decoration – you can even jazz them up a little with sequins or beads – go crazy!

Merry Christmas!

Easy-Peasy Button Bracelet

Welcome to the long-awaited second installment of Make – At – Home with Masham Gallery! Following the success of our last step-by-step creative guide, we’ve chosen another beautiful and simple piece of eye-catching jewellery, made entirely from bits and pieces we all have lying around the house! Enjoy!

You Will Need:

1.At least a 12 inch length jewellery cord (available in all good haberdasheries) OR embroidery thread (this may sound generous but its better to start with a long piece and cut it down later, trust me!). Think before about the colour scheme of your bracelet and choose your thread accordingly

2. Buttons! Stick to one or two specific colours, or go wild and use everything!

Note: Buttons which are flatish with holes through them work best for this project. Buttons which have a loop at the back cannot be securely threaded and therefore don’t sit well.

3. A pair of scissors – nail scissors work best to make a nice neat job of it!

That’s it! Told you it would be simple. The best thing about this project is that there is only minimum use of scissors and no glue is involved, so children can join in too.

Step One:

Make a loop at one end of your length of thread by doubling over the thread and tying a secure knot. This will be part of your fastening, and will have a button pushed through it, so while you are making the hole, find a button which will fit through nicely without being too small and put it to one side.

Step Two:

Start threading your button on to your thread. Larger buttons make a bigger statement, but you can always layer two or three buttons on top of one another to use up the smaller buttons (see below)

TOP TIP! Embroidery thread, and even the best jewellery cord can fray, and this is most annoying. To prevent this, wrap a tiny strip of sticky tape around the end of your thread and cut it off when finished!

Step Three:

Your bracelet is taking shape, and at this point you need to start keeping an eye on length. As you will see, threading through buttons (especially if you are layering them) will take up quite a lot of thread, and the 12 inches you started with won’t be looking quite so generous! While you are threading, keep wrapping the bracelet around you wrist to check the length. Everyone’s wrists are different, but it generally takes between 7 and 9 medium to large buttons to make a completed bracelet.

Step Four:

Once you have threaded on all your buttons, thread on the end button (you put it to one side at the start remember?). To secure it, tie a knot using the remaining length of string and trim the end with scissors. Trim the loose end of the loop at the other end of your bracelet too.

Ta Da! A beautiful and unique bracelet and an excellent way of using up all those buttons! A great Christmas present, don’t you think?

We would love to hear what you have to say about our Make – At – Home projects, please leave a comment.

Join us again very soon for a festive Make – At – Home. Handmade Christmas decorations anyone?

Love from The Gallery

This quirky and eye-catching brooch is incredibly simple to make, and is a great way of using up any old bits of fabric, ribbons, buttons, beads or sequins you have lying around (as we all have these lying around I’m sure). You have free reign to decide the size, shape and colour of your creation   – to demonstrate I’m using blue and yellow felt (pansy – inspired) with matching buttons.

You will need:

At least 3 pieces of fabric (you may need more if the fabric you’re using is particularly thin) for the main part of your brooch (and a tiny amount for the backing).

Buttons, beads or sequins of your choice for the added decoration.

A brooch back (easy to come by in craft shops, on ebay or off your old brooches)

Or, if no brooch back is to be found, a medium sized safety pin is a decent substitute.

A needle and thread, or for the super speedy approach, super glue.

STEP ONE:

Your three pieces of fabric will be layered on top of one another – decide which you would like on the bottom/middle/top. Cut each piece of fabric into a simple flower shape. The bottom piece needs to be the largest, the top piece needs to be the smallest, and the middle needs to be…well, somewhere in the middle.

STEP TWO:

Arrange your fabric pieces on top of one another like so:

STEP THREE:

Grab a handful of your buttons/beads and arrange them on your fabric flower. To attach, sew the buttons through all the pieces of fabric so that they become attached together. *

*If you are using super glue only you will need to attach each layer of fabric together with a blob of glue in the centre of each piece.

STEP FOUR:

Turn your flower over – there will be a tangle of crossed threads on the back. To cover this unsightly mess, cut a circular piece of fabric and attach with super glue.

If you have a brooch back, attach to your brooch with super glue. If, like me, you are using a safety pin, cut a small rectangle of fabric, thread through your safety pin and super glue to your brooch. Make sure the opening side of the safety pin is facing up!

And VOILA! Your very own unique flower brooch! Attach to anything you like (we’ve used one of The Gallery’s lovely bags to demonstrate).

Remember to check out the website regularly for more Make – At – Home ideas.

For fun art and craft workshops check out Masham Arts Festival 23^rd – 31^st October 2009.

www.mashamarts.com