We’re still celebrating 10 years of Less is More Challenges with loads of prizes up for grabs. All you need to do is make a clean and simple card or project featuring ‘flowers’ on just one layer – few or no embellishments, large areas of white space but no adding any layers (e.g. whole card die cuts) to the card. Fuller instructions are here. Enter it into the challenge and you’ll be in with a chance. Here’s my take on the theme:
There’s a birthday celebration over at Less is More Challenge blog. The clean and simple challenge has been running for 10 years! There are lots of prizes to be won if you’d like to enter, with the birthday theme being the colour ‘chocolate’. I decided a tenth birthday cake was in order and came up with this card:
A Less is More Design Team post again – today’s theme over on the clean and simple challenge blog is a recipe and is for ‘in a row’. There was just one stamp I had that would fit the bill, and it’s a golden oldie from Penny Black. Coloured with ProMarkers using the stamp sample as a guide. It’s a one layer card, though this wasn’t one of the challenge criteria.
After a Christmas hiatus, Less is More is back with a new clean and simple card challenge. ‘We’re probably all sick of sweat pants and casual clothes, so let’s look forward to a time when we can all dress up again’ sets off the clothing/fashion theme. I remembered that I had done some paper piecing of dresses when I was with Craftwork Cards and managed to unearth the ‘Sophie’ stamp set from 2016 which is perfect for dress-up!
Another challenge is live at Less is More. This time it is a one layer card with the theme ‘festive’. As before, one layer cards mean just that: no hiding behind layered papers or mats, perfect printing first time and minimal embellishments. Even die cuts aren’t allowed as they are an added layer. I normally paper-piece the stamp I chose to use, so that was not an option in a one layer card. Instead, I went with some colouring-in:
I stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black using a stamp platform, and then again with Versamark as I then decided to heat emboss the outline with clear gloss to make it stand out a little. I then coloured in with ProMarkers adding lots of layers and then highlights with a correction pen and Posca markers. Finally, I added some stickles and liquid pearls to give a little more interest to the card.
It’s time for another challenge at Less is More… This time we have a colour challenge: Blue and Silver or Red and Gold. For me, they are classic Christmas colours, so I’ve used that theme for my cards this time around. First up, my choice for my design team card. It’s hard to see with the reflections, but the snowflakes are heat embossed in silver. The watercolour is Chipped Sapphire Distress Stain flooded into water, then splattered with water and blotted dry.
It’s recipe time at Less is More and the theme chosen is ‘more than one type of foliage’. One of the main aims of the challenge (aside from making sure the card is clean and simple) is to make the theme to be the focus of the card. There was only one stamp set I could think of in my collection that would fit the bill – a set of five fern fronds by Hero Arts. Here’s the eventual winner, from three I made, for my design team card:
It’s a one layer card challenge at Less is More today – a card made from a single piece of card folded in half where the image is stamped or printed directly onto the card stock. It also has no additional layers and only minimal embellishments. It can be trickier than you think, especially if you are stamping and muck up the print first go (or several goes!). One slip with the pen/ink and you have to start over. Here’s my take on the theme ‘Cheers!’:
It’s a colour challenge at Less is More for the next fortnight and the chosen theme is ‘shades of purple’. I had three goes at picking out the colours – it’s curious how when you put some colours together they show up different hues in adjacent colours that you didn’t notice before (and weren’t purple). One technique, in particular, showed this up perfectly (read below). Anyhoo, here’s my take on the challenge and two bonus cards…
Over on the Less is More challenge blog this week is a lucky dip and from the pot came the chalkboard technique. In essence, this uses white pigment ink on black card, with the option of adding white heat embossing for even more contrast. An example video is available at the end of this post.
Three cards for you today in reverse order…
