Decoupage stamps

I'm rapidly approaching the end of my holiday.  Lots of projects in intermediate steps but I did manage to get something done to share with you today- another fun project you can do with stamps.

The stamp that's staring in today's project is the latest stamp produced by Strapper's Stupefying Stamp Co.  This stamp shows a lovely picture of Strapper walking through The Fidgety Forest.  The Fidgety Forest is the first book about the tales of Strapper and is written by Peter Yorke, with illustrations by Alan Bailey.   The book is very reminiscent of Enid Blyton's short stories with a dash of The Enchanted Wood series and I do recommend it.

But let's get back to the stamps.  This technique works well with most stamp designs.  I've made many of these using Discworld Cinderellas (because I had spares) but I've also seen it done using cancelled regular stamps.  For most stamps you will need four copies.  This gives you about as much depth as you are going to achieve on something this size (this particular stamp measures 35 x 29 mm).

You will also need:

• silicon-  I use some acid free silicon from a local craft shop (Riot or Lincraft for Melbournians)
• A sharp knife- I use Excel knife.  I think it's this one, but I'm not 100% sure, I bought it several years ago.  I've tried a lot of knives over the years and what you want is something with a nice fine point and SHARP!  You are far more likely to cut yourself and wreck your project with a blunt, cheap knife.
• toothpicks- these make it much easier to apply controlled amounts of silicon
• possibly a metal ruler to let you cut straight lines
• card to make your project on (I like black but that's entirely up to you!)
• A cutting mat
• something to emboss with (either an embossing tool or a blunt pin or toothpick or dried up pen etc)

Step one- if you are using a different stamp to me you will need to analyse the design.  What is in the foreground of the image?  What is at the back?  Once you have that sorted out, it's time to start cutting.  Take your time and go slow.  Below is the image of the four stamp layers I've cut.  The first stamp is left uncut- that's the background layer.  Then going from left to right, top to bottom are layers 2, 3 and 4.

From left to right, top to bottom:  Layer 1(back), 2, 3 and 4

A word of advice at this point- have somewhere safe to keep your bits!  These can fly away horribly fast.  All you need is one sneeze or puff of wind and you'll need some more stamps!

Next step is to emboss and shape the stamp pieces.  You could skip this step if you wanted, but I find it adds a lot of depth and enhances the detail of the stamp.  You first need to know where you want the shaping from the back of the stamp.  If you have a light box, great!  I don't have one though, so I use a good old fashioned torch.  Place the stamp piece, face down and use a pencil to mark any areas you want to emboss.  Below are my pieces with the tree roots marked out, since I know I want to round the tree trunks down to the roots.

When embossing and shaping, what you do is use a rounded tool the back of the stamp piece that is resting on a soft but firm surface (like a pile of paper or a mouse pad).  Harder surfaces will let you have more detailed embossing- experiment with different tools on different surfaces and just play around with your pieces until you are satisfied.  Below is the front and back of the two layers above after I embossed them (click to embiggen).

Once all the pieces are shaped to your satisfaction it's time to start sticking them down.  First stick the uncut stamp onto your piece of card.

Now use the toothpick to put even sized blobs of silicon onto the back of Layer 2.  Even sized blobs mean the layer will stick out the same distance at all points.  And because silicon does not flatten as it dries, the distance the layer sticks up from the bottom layer will not change once it's dry, which gives us the 3D effect.

Carefully position Layer 2 over the background stamp and lightly press to ensure contact but NOT so hard you squash the silicon out.  You want Layer 2 to sit 1-2 mm above the bottom.  Let this dry.

Once each layer is dry, add the following layers the same way.

When I finished the stamp, I decided I wanted the title to be more prominent so I went back and cut out the 'Tales from Fidgety Forest' from the remainder of Layer's 4 stamp (good tip- keep the offcuts until you are done- they can be handy in case of emergencies).  Because paper is hard to manipulate and almost impossible to glue when you get to the size of individual letters, I cut each word out as a single unit.

And it's done.  Have fun- just make sure you don't cut up any rare stamps in the process!