Autumn Color Play...
September 09, 2016
Good morning! Tomorrow kicks off the September Papertrey Ink release (I can't wait!!) and we'll be sharing new holiday products and projects galore, but before I get to that, I've been itching to play around a little more with my fall stamps!
Autumn is the season where the landscape is painted with the most amazing colors. I really wanted to pull out some fall images and just experiment with some of these amazing nature-inspired color combos. Since it's still looking pretty summer out my window, I had to turn to Pinterest for a little color inspiration. Here are some amazing images I found and used as inspiration for my projects today!
So beautiful, don't you think? The whole rainbow, really. Reds, oranges, yellows, greens, and even some gorgeous deep purples. I love how the different colors blend into each other. So inspiring!
I set to work to try and capture some of these gorgeous colors in my stamping. To keep things simple, I pulled out just a few autumn sets to play with - Leaf Prints, Color Pop: Autumn, and a holiday set - Spruce & Sprigs, because I love some of the berries from that set and think they work just as wonderfully for autumn as they do for winter/Christmas.
I started by diecutting a whole pile of leaves and berries from these sets using Stamper's Select White cardstock. I didn't worry about what my cards would look like when I was finished, I just simply wanted to focus on stamping and playing with color. This was kind of a fun exercise as it's very different from how I usually approach my projects! I did all of my stamping first, then assembled my cards later -- and they came together so easily!
So let's start with this one first. This was the first group of leaves that I stamped - I stuck to more traditional fall colors, just to get my feet wet and get the creative juices going. I stamped everything with my MISTI so that I could really layer the colors. I used a sponge to ink up the stamps which gave me a bit more control over where the ink was going. Sometimes I would ink up just half of a leaf with one color, stamp repeatedly, then ink the other half of the leaf with a different ink color, allowing the two colors to blend and overlap.
I used lots of ink colors here - Summer Sunrise, Orange Zest, Terracotta Tile, Harvest Gold, New Leaf, Scarlet Jewel, and even a bit of Raspberry Fizz. I had fun studying the inspiration photos and really looking at all of the different colors in the leaves in the photos! To create the card, I clustered everything in the upper left corner of a Double Ups: Rectangle diecut, which was cut from some Fancy Pants woodgrain patterned paper in my stash. The leaves here are all from the Leaf Prints set, the berries are from Spruce & Sprig, and the sentiment and acorns are from the Give Thanks set.
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For my next cluster of leaves, I got a bit more adventurous and tried to replicate the look of the soft greens and plums from the first inspiration photo above. The soft green on the backside of the leaves is so pretty. I pulled out lots of different inks -- Mint Julep, Berry Sorbet, Autumn Rose, Scarlet Jewel, and Vintage Jadeite. I love how the green blends with the soft pinks and plums - I wouldn't have tried this combo on my own without the inspiration photo, but I love how it turned out!
The largest leaf is from the Leaf Prints set, the others, along with the pink berries, are from Color Pop Autumn, and the darker berries towards the bottom are from Spruce & Sprigs. The stencils in the Color Pop Autumn kit make it so easy and fun to blend the colors! The sentiment is from Bold & Beautiful, and the patterned paper is from the Winter Woods paper collection.
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The purples and greens in the third inspiration photo above are just stunning, aren't they? I was a little intimidated to try to capture that in my stamping, but figured what have a got to lose? I pulled out Scarlet Jewel, Amethyst Allure, Royal Velvet, Ripe Avocado, and Vintage Jadeite inks and got to work. And I'm so glad I did - this one turned out to be my favorite of the day! I love the rich, deep purples - very different from what I normally reach for when stamping fall leaves, but so pretty and still autumn looking!
I mixed some of the leaves from the Leaf Prints set with the hydrangeas from the Color Pop: Autumn set. I wanted to give them a pretty, rustic background, so I pulled out some woodgrain patterned paper from my stash (sorry, not sure where this is from!). The sentiment was done with with stamps and dies from the Color Pop: Autumn kit. I also added a few clear sequins for some sparkle.
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My last card today was inspired by the photo above with the vibrant red leaves contrasted with the deep, rich blueberries. Just stunning! I diecut and stamped leaves from the Leaf Prints and Color Pop: Autumn set using a blend of Terracotta Tile, Pure Poppy, and Americana inks. The blueberries were done using the stencils and stamps from the Color Pop: Autumn kit, using Enchanted Evening and Royal Velvet inks for the berries, and Smokey Shadow and True Black for the stems/leaves.
I created a background for the leaves by doing a bit of watercoloring using Enchanted Evening and Royal Velvet reinkers. The sentiment was diecut using the Big Basics: Thinking of You die, cut from Winter Wisteria cardstock and sponged with a bit of Royal Velvet ink. I added a few clear sequins for a bit of sparkle, and mounted the finished panel onto a kraft card base.
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Thanks so much for stopping by today to check out my projects! I had so much fun playing around with some autumn color schemes that were a bit outside my normal comfort zone. I hope you enjoyed it too, and are inspired to try one of these for yourself!
We'll see you back here tomorrow when we kick off the September countdown! I hope you're ready for all of the awesome holiday goodies headed your way! I can't wait!