MORE BONUS ONLINE FEATURES
 
Scrap Blog
Product Spotlight
Technique Corner
ARCHIVES: 5 Min Scrap Chat
ARCHIVES: Tech Corner

How I plan a page changes, depending on why I want to scrap. It really depends if I’m scrapbooking for the fun of it (often because I have a new product I’d like to use) or if I’m sitting down with the goal to share a story using a specific photo. If I begin with a certain photo in mind, I take the picture to my patterned paper stash to decide which papers I’ll use. From there it’s a combination of adding journaling and/or embellishments to support the story. If I’m sitting down to play, I just follow my artistic feelings and go where the layout takes me.

I get inspiration by looking at things with an arty eye. My style is a combination of shabby, pretty, vintage, soft, and layered. I think my love affair with this style is rooted in my home décor preferences. However, I get inspired the most through mixed media artists who seem to use no rules or boundaries in their art. I also enjoy scouring home décor magazines looking at colour schemes and trends. I also find tons of inspiration in antiquing and shopping – whether it’s looking at clothing labels, or finding a vintage book – pretty much anything can be looked at with an artistic eye.

My style shines through in the products I use and design. I think I bring a soft, feminine, vintage eye to the Melissa Frances team and my love for antiques comes through in the products I help design. I’m in LOVE with the Melissa Frances glitter chipboard letters. While designing our newest collection of papers, we wanted to really capture the Vintage shabby look. One of the hallmarks of this look is a chandelier and we wanted to capture the glitter and glam of one on scrapbook pages. Our solution was to add glitter to chipboard. It looks beautiful with our new papers. We can’t wait to get these products into the hands of consumers!

There are several ways to get your own vintage look. The one technique I use more than any other is to distress all the edges of every paper and embellishment on my layouts with a light brown ink pad. I love the soft, antique look it gives! My other favorite thing is to buy old books or ledgers (from an antique store) and use snippets from the pages in my layouts. Once again, it helps to convey that vintage look.