Each month we get a glimpse behind the scenes of our Scrap Girls ScrapSimple Club designers, and this month’s designer is Elisha Barnett!
Click here to check out Elisha’s ScrapSimple Club at a great price!
Where did you find the inspiration for this club?
The inspiration for the club came from local folk art. I’m a relatively recent transplant to Pennsylvania Dutch Country, and I just love it! Amish quilts, Pennsylvania Dutch Hex signs on barns, and tole painting have enamored me. As a scrapbooker and paper crafter, I’ve been most enamored by the art of “Scherenschnitte,” or papercutting. Lately, I’ve found that it’s been particularly trendy. I’ve seen lots of interpretations of the old art form in international magazines and on paper crafting blogs and websites.
How did you come up with the name of your club?
At first I was calling the club “Scherenschnitte,” which means “scissor cuts” in German. Here in Pennsylvania Dutch country, the art form is well-known and understood by that name. However, I felt that it was too obscure for an international consumer and difficult to pronounce. I decided to use the word “Papercutting” instead.
(Click on images to go to thee product page)
When you started working on your club, what was the first thing you did?
The first thing I did was make up an inspiration board. This is an art form seen around the world and has been adapted to many different cultural styles. There are beautiful traditional and modern representations everywhere! I searched out the many interpretations, narrowed it down to a few of my favorite examples, and put some example of what I wanted to create on an idea board. The idea board serves two purposes: 1. it gives those in charge of creative direction at Scrap Girls an idea of what I have in mind – kind of like a “pitch” for the club 2. I went back to this board every time I felt overwhelmed, helping keep me on track as I created the products.
http://madebyjulene.com/portfolio
http://suzy-taylor.blogspot.com/
http://wolfeyebrows.wordpress.com/2012/07/05/tokyo-from-memory/
The club includes several products. Did you start and complete each one before moving on to the next?
For the most part, yes. The ScrapSimple Paper Templates: Papercutting were first and were a source on which to build the rest of the products. In fact, all of the leaves in ScrapSimple Embellishment Templates: Cut Leaves were created using the same leaf shapes as one of the paper templates.
What was your favorite thing to design?
My favorite product to design was ScrapSimple Alpha Templates: Cut Leaves. It was probably the most time consuming product to design, but I enjoyed the process. I designed one letter using patterns and styles that I created, then developed a series of actions to speed up the process for the other letters. I was really able to work Photoshop to my advantage. I learned new techniques that I will be able to use going forward to improve my design process and workflow. There’s always something new to learn.
About how long did it take you to design this club?
The design work was completed in about two and a half months. Another few weeks were dedicated to quality checking and layouts.