The Crafter's Workshop BlogFloral Wreath – using stencils to guide your art

Hi creative souls, Tammy (aka Tambarambaa) here sharing my latest creation.

I’m a bit proud of this one, and I used stencils to take my arty play to the next level.

You see they guided me, gave me confidence and gave me correct dimensions to then add color. Let’s take a look…..

art journal page with roses on a circular wreath

TCW provided me with some gorgeous goodies to play with, but the art and opinions are mine.

close up of quote:
surround yourself with the dreamers and the doers, the believers and thinker, but most of all, surround yourself with those who see greatness within you, even when you don't see it yourself

So I began with a blank art journal page, and I tore up some collage paper and scraps and adhered this to my page using TCW9011 Matte Gel Medium. I applied this with a spatula.

Once dry, I added TCW9001 White Gesso over the entire page, using a palette knife to spread it around.

adhering collage paper to art journal page with gel medium and adding white gesso

Once dry, I added a few more scraps of collage paper, just to give a hint of color.

tracing around circular stencil to get a wreath shape

Next I grabbed stencil TCW970 Color Wheel and laid this over the center of my page. I used a pencil to trace around one of the circles, to give me a circular shape that will become my floral wreath.

I then mixed both TCW9001 White Gesso and TCW9002 Black Gesso together to get a grey tone.

I then selected stencil TCW823 Rose Bouquet and sponged the grey through the stencil, specifically over the roses in opposite sides of the wreath.

mix black and white gesso to get a grey color and then sponge through rose stencil

I then repeated this process using stencil TCW658 Jungle Vines and both the flowers and leaves from TCW914 Plumeria. I made sure they followed a circular shape to look like a floral wreath.

sponge through leaves and vines until you have created a wreath

This becomes the base for my art. As I said above, it gives me the shapes to follow, and the correct dimensions to paint over and makes me look like a better artist than I am!

Ok time to add color!!

add color to the roses and leaves and flowers letting the stencils be your guide

I began with pink roses and then added blue florals and green branches and leaves, letting the stencil patterns guide me. I felt this freed me up – instead of focusing on the sizes and placement, I could just get lost in the process.

Now I began to add loose scribbles with a water soluble pencil. Next I added water – now it really starts to come together.

scribble around the edges with a water soluble pencil and add water to create shadows and depth

I also began to add in some shadowing around the flowers and wreath shape.

adding in deep navy and grey paint around shapes as shadow

Now at this point in the process, I needed to go and sort my children, and organize dinner etc, and unfortunately couldn’t get back to the project until night time. I usually like to complete my art during the day, as it provides more accurate photo colors etc, however with busy and long work days looming, I didn’t have much choice!

So let’s keep going, and please excuse the lighting!!

adding in details - mark making and dots

I basically kept adding loose lines, paint and a few dots and brush marks here and there.

The final step was to add a title and some journaling.

I decided stencil TCW921 Word Stems would be perfect – that dreamer stem suited a quote that I had in mind. I lay it down over my page and swiped TCW9004 Light and Fluffy Modeling Paste over it.

Once dry, I added my journaling and quote.