Video: Impressionistic Stamping with Liquid Watercolors

2018 Catalog Bold Prints Videos Watercolor

Feb 19, 2018 Jessica Frost-Ballas

Good morning and Happy Monday! Today I'm sharing a few cards using a technique I like to call impressionistic stamping with liquid watercolors and a few Bold Prints background stamps! The new liquid watercolors blend beautifully and this technique lets the paint do all the work for you!I also have a video showing you how to create this look. You can watch the video below or in HD at our Youtube channel here!

To start I added drops of our new liquid watercolors to a craft mat. For these cards I tried to stick to a color palette reminiscent of Monet's famous impressionistic waterlilies painting so I used a mixture of Pine and Indigo along with Deep Ocean and Mulled Wine. I spritzed them a few times with a water bottle until the area was quite saturated (the watercolor dots won't really seem to move at this point but just wait!). Then I simply placed my Bold Prints background stamp on the liquid watercolors and smeared it around at bit. I lifted it carefully and then "stamped" it on a piece of watercolor paper. I let it sit for a few seconds to give the paper time to absorb the watercolors. Then I lifted the stamp and used a paper towel to blot up any puddles of watercolor before setting it aside to dry. I repeated the process and was able to easily get several backgrounds before the colors blended too much.

I used the Abstract Skylines and Floral Mandala Bold Prints background stamp to create these looks and then finished the cards with a few variations. For the first two cards I die-cut the happy from Happy Stamp & Cut three times for each card and layered them together to create a chipboard like embellishment. Then I stamped the rest of the sentiment from the set onto white cardstock with Versamark and heat-embossed it with Detail Black embossing powder. I trimmed those down to a label and adhered them to the watercolor panels. Then I used liquid adhesive to adhered the black die-cut and added a coating of Spectrum Noir clear sparkle to the black cardstock.

I explained this in the video but when I was beginning to experiment with this watercolor technique I had a few backgrounds that ended up with a splotchy section in the middle from the paint pooling. I decided to see if I could cover up those areas with sentiments and other embellishments. For one of the cards I die-cut a heart from the Nesting Hearts Infinity Dies from vellum cardstock and adhered it over the splotch. Then I stamped a house from Welcome Neighbor and die-cut it with the coordinating dies. I also stamped a sentiment from the same set onto black cardstock and heat-embossed it with white embossing powder. I layered the sentiment over the vellum heart and then added the house on top. The second card follows a similar layout to the first two but using the Congrats Stamp & Cut and House Stamp & Cut!

My last card uses the Hello Stamp & Cut set and keeps the sentiment closer to the top third of the card. In this close-up I really feel like you can see why I call it impressionistic stamping. You can see areas where the mandala is clearly visible and areas where it's more loosely suggested. And I kinda love that! :) I also really love the way those four colors combined to create all those shades of teal, purple, and blue!

I hope this gives you some new ideas for how to use your liquid watercolors! I'd love to know if you give this a try and what colors you choose to use! :) Thanks so much for visiting and have an amazing day!