Showing posts with label altered. Show all posts
Showing posts with label altered. Show all posts

Thursday, October 25, 2018

Altoid Tin Altars #G45DarkSide

I was so excited to see this months Graphic 45 challenge: #G45DarkSide. This was just the prompt I needed to get to business on a project I’ve been thinking about for a long while.

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

I’m a big fan of altering altoid tins. You can create these tins to hold just about anything. Create a fancy little sewing kit. Keep one in your car filled with emergency bits and bobs. You can fit a surprising amount in those little tins.

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

I’ve created two #G45DarkSide tins here. One tin pairs papers from Communique—Deluxe Collector's Edition with brass Staples Decorative Hardware.

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

The other uses Floral Shoppe with shabby chic Staples Decorative Hardware

The tins contain a sort of storage space which, if careful, can fit a surprising amount of goodies!
Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

All of the items above fit comfortably in that trap-door space.

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

My tins will be used as tiny portable travel altars. Each contains matches, a vile of herbs, incense, candles, gemstones, a tiny crystal ball, vessels for libations and offerings, magnetic images and more!

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

But if altars aren’t your thing… no worries! The video tutorial I’ve created demonstrates how to cover an altoid style tin and create the trapdoor element inside. So take those instructions to create something that suits YOU.

Portable Altoid Tin Altar #G45DarkSide - Nichola Battilana

I'm smitten with my little altars but I totally encourage you to take this idea and run with it, making something filled with little things useful or treasured by you.

Supply List:

Antique Brass Metal Clock Keys
Antique Brass Ornate Metal Keys
Antique Brass Ornate Metal Key Holes
Shabby Chic Ornate Metal Key Holes
Antique Brass Stamped Metal Brads
Shabby Chic Ornate Metal Brads
Floral Shoppe
Communique—Deluxe Collector's Edition
Couture - Fabulous

Cardboard
Charms
Small wooden blocks
Glue
Black ink pad
Altoid style tin
Bits and bobs to fill your tin

Saturday, September 30, 2017

Halloween Hotrods with Tutorial

One of my very favourite projects from last year were the Mad Max hot rods built with my buddy Paula Mould. It's one of those projects that is just so much messy fun. I mean you COULD be neat and proper and make something stunning... or you can let loose and just glue crap to other crap and have a grand old time doing it.

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

There's Halloween junk all over the Dollarstore aisles and it made me nostalgic and inspired to revisit that project. This time with a video tute (see below) for you to make your own monster machines.

Since this is a dollarstore, stash busting project, it's not going to break the bank.

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

We're starting out with simple plastic toy cars and trucks.

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

Embellishing the heck out of them. Giving them a knock out paint job. And ending up with something like this...

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

They check off most of the boxes for a kid friendly project. They're cheap, fun, neatness isn't exactly a factor. You WILL need to supervise/modify the project depending on age appropriateness (i.e. glue guns are the devil) but it's do-able for and little hotrodders you know.

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

I've just used my trusty old hot glue gun for this project. If you want something that can be handled (crashed? raced?) and remain somewhat intact, you'll need to invest/experiment with a better method of adhesion. Or, you know, let them be the $3 works of art they are and just enjoy the destruction.

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

Here's your supply list:

Toy cars: trucks, busses, boats, planes... whatever strikes your fancy!
Halloween swag: skeletons, bugs, beads, bones, skulls, spiders, bats
Black spray paint: I used gloss in the tute... I MUCH prefer flat/matte

Acrylic paint: I mostly used a product from Colourarte called Silks Acrylic Glaze It has a nice pearlescent finish and it was in my stash. Metalics looks super cool.
Paint brush
Sponge brush
(for blending)
GLUE: I used hot glue because it's fast and easy. Do what works for you!
Cutting tools: for chopping up spiders and plastic skeletons
Tape: for covering any bits you don't want spray painted

Halloween Hotrods: Dollarstore project with video tute • Nichola Battilana

That's it weirdos! Go make something hotroddy!

Here's how to put them together.

Friday, January 22, 2016

Embellished Opera Gloves for Tresors de Luxe

A couple of years ago we went to this amazing garage sale. You picked up a cardboard box and crammed it with as much stuff as you could for a flat price. There was even a barn filled with 'junk' that you could pick through. In that junk were scads of dainty satiny gloves.

I have been waiting for ages for an excuse to play with them :)

Embellished Opera Gloves - Nichola Battilana

Before you worry too much about a pair of vintage gloves being sacrificed for the sake of crafting, these were sitting in a barn, forgotten about for years. They were not flawless by any stretch of the imagination. Now that your mind is at ease, let's see how this pretty gold embellishment is made up...

Embellished Opera Gloves - Nichola Battilana

I deconstructed this Gold Lace Applique and used the two swirly sides down the gloves. Wanting to extend the embellishment further down the glove I placed cut elements from the Gold Lace Trim down the back of the hand. To cover the join of the two pieces I've added this sort of starburst Gold Lace Trim.

Embellished Opera Gloves - Nichola Battilana

And if I can't get the hubs to take me somewhere worthy of these elegant mits, I'm just going to get gussied up for my morning tea. Pinky up!


All lace embellishment are from the January Blog Design Team Kit