Cafe Colorize Frames

I think these colorize Cafe tea and coffee cups from Tim Holtz Sizzix Chapter 1 have such a cool mid-century modern feel to them. When I looked at them I immediately just felt vintage Disney vibes for some reason, so that is the inspiration I went with. I wanted to make some small framed decor pieces that I thought would go well in a tiered tray or in a coffee area. 

In going with the mid-century modern Disney inspiration, I always think of animator and imagineer Mary Blair. I took a photo of this piece of her artwork that hangs in the lobby of the Disneyland Hotel a couple of years ago. It is a fabulous example of her amazing use of color. She would combine colors that people really hadn't put together. Here she has indigos, sapphires, olive greens, golds, creams, browns and white. It's fantastic. So I used her use of color for my Cafe Framed Art pieces.

To begin with I cut two of the new Bubbling background dies from the White Heavystock paper. But I didn't use the Chrome cutting plate, I just used my regular old cutting plates and it didn't cut through which is what I was hoping! It just cut through the front so it left the impression or the pattern, but with all the bubbles in place. Many people would have thought it was a fail, but I thought it was perfect! I adhered both pieces to the back panel of the Mini Framed Panels. I put a nice layer of Distress Collage Medium on the panel and then pressed the Bubbling paper into it so it was flat and adhered all over the panel. Then put a thin layer of Collage medium over the top and lightly rubbed it in so it was smooth and there were no brushstrokes.

Once the Collage Medium is dry, scribble some Pumice Stone Distress Crayon over the whole thing.

Spray some water on it and rub the crayon down into all the crevices to make the Bubbling background stand out, then lightly wipe it off, leaving the crayon only in the crevices.

Then I took a piece of black Cardstock the size of the panel. I scored it so that it would be 1/8" smaller all the way around than the inside of the frame to make a mat to go on top of the Bubbling background. The background die doesn't cover the entire inside of the frame as it is a little smaller, so to make it look clean and finished, you need to mat it.

Once you have it scored, Use your Tonic Cutting Blade and trim right along the score lines to make your mats. You will need two of these as well, One for each frame.

Here you can see that I painted the frames with Hickory Smoke Distress Stain, then I aged them with a little Walnut Stain Distress Crayon before I adhered them to the background panel with the matted Bubbling piece.

The word tea was cut from the Stretch Alphanumeric lowercase. I cut one from Distress White Heavystock colored with Brushed Corduroy. Then I cut three more from black cardstock. I layered them together with Distress Collage Medium to make the words stand out.

Let's talk about the colors I used for the tea cup and the coffee cup. I used only a few colors, but the key is to use some of the colors full strength and others you lighten with water. So the very lightest color is the White Heavystock with hardly any Old Paper Distress Ink on it. Then the second lightest is Old Paper. The green gold colors are various strengths of Crushed Olive. The browns are Brushed Corduroy and the blue is Chipped Sapphire. It is easier to start with a lighter color and then add more if it needs to be darker since you can't take color away once you have added it.

I did the same colors and techniques for the coffee mini panel.

Here are those layered letters again.

And the coffee cup with those glorious Mary Blair colors. I love it!

These Cafe Mini Panels are really a straight forward, fairly easy project to complete and will be the perfect addition to a cute tiered tray or coffee area. 

All of the new release dies are listed below, as well as the Distress papers and such if you need a place to get them.

Thank you so much for stopping by! I hope you enjoy the new Sizzix Chapter 1 dies from Tim Holtz as much as I am.

Tami

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