Paris At Make My Monday. . . . . . . . . .

I was honoured when asked to be a guest designer at Make My Monday for October. Making cards is not my first love but I couldn't say no to such a wonderful opportunity.

The theme this week at MMM is Paris - a really gorgeous theme as it is a city I have been lucky enough to visit on several occasions and each time I fall in love with it all over again. I felt that the design for my card should just let the city speak for itself and what better image than the iconic Eiffel Tower could I use?

I decided to opt for a vintage image taken through one of those typically French windows, framed by beautiful iron work. This image was taken in the early 1920's and therefore the lack of clarity can be forgiven I think, don't you?

I found a tutorial for flowers on Jennie Atkinson's blog 'Living The Dream' - if you have never seen Jennie's work then you need to go there now and be prepared to be wowed as she is tremendously creative! I adapted one of her tutorials to make this flower and will also be trying out her gorgeous Dahlia tutorial too!
Thank you so much Jennie for your inspiration.

Here's my card and a few words to describe how I made it:

Perhaps it is a cliche but Paris is considered to be a city of love, so I wanted to reflect this romantic notion in my choice of imagery, colours and embellishments.

I found the image on the internet and printed it without any editing because I think it's beautiful just as it is - beautifully composed, monochrome and slighty distorted - no mega pixel cameras in those days.
The inky background was created using distress inks and stamping in one of the colours used. The edges were inked heavily with the darkest colour and machine stitching was added to the edges. Probably, because of my job in previous years, I feel unable to make the stitching untidy so I hope you'll forgive me for trying to keep it straight!!

The flower is made using several inked layers of tattered florals and some beads. I could have gone to town on the centre of the flower but decided that a light touch of just a few beads was enough - any more may have resulted in over kill I fear!

Rather than add a specific sentiment, I used a Paris stamped script image, cut it out, inked it up and finally covered with glossy accents. The cut out was attached using foam pads to add extra height. Some matching wired ribbon was manipulated into shape and attached. A piece of Tim cardstock was used for the base and the edges were 'roughed up' a little.

I like the finished piece because I set out to produce a somewhat grungy, yet totally feminine and romantic image and in my opinion, the original idea is pretty close to the finished piece. What do you think?