Artist Trading Blocks

Silence is a word that is not often achievable in my home with my large family. 

As you have probably noticed my blog has been a little quiet. I have not done a blog post for a while 

and I thought I would break the silence by sharing a couple of small projects

My Time on graphic 45 is over and I have stepped down from my other Design team 

commitments as well, my creative side has been a little subdued of late but I will continue to use the products that I love in some way.

I have quite a few projects that I have not shared on my blog so I will try to catch up I think.

Recently I have discovered a concept that has probably been around for a while.

As I under stand, it is a take on artist trading cards. Artist trading blocks have a three dimensional twist and give the opportunity to embellish each side instead of a flat card.

I have created a couple of examples using two different themes.

The first one is a mechanical industrial them and uses one of my favourite
embellishments, cogs and gears.

I have used a combination of die cut gears and metal ones. The die cuts
were inked using distress inks and layered with metal cogs.

I have also added metal feet. I think they give a finished look and add extra detail. 

The metal corners top on each top corner coordinate well with the metal feet and 

contribute to the completed look of the block.

There are also many other assorted metal embellishments that extend the mechanical theme and 

also give it a little steampunk flair.

The graphic 45 metal butterfly I have altered using embossing powders and a zipper 

embellishment for the body.

The second example is a Graphic 45 based Artist Trading bock using their 

Raining Cats and Dogs collection.

The top uses a shaped graphic 45 metal flower in combination with the die cut flowers
and chip board and metal brad.

I created a mini frame style side incorporating different embellishments in each
section of the frame.

I also made a die cut dog kennel and utilised co-ordinating raining cats and dogs
chipboard components on the remaining two sides

Artist trading blocks are fun to make and a different way of using paper 

collections you love to create with.

Swapping with fellow crafters would be a fun idea and bring the a paper crafting community 

a little closer .

I would love to here your thoughts on this concept and my examples 

thanks for stopping by

Andrew