Hello! It's Kathy Martin back today with Technique Week and the topic today is die cutting. With the abundance of thin metal dies available there's no end to the creative potential for your paper craft projects. Today I'm going to talk about a few of my favorite trends using thin metal dies and share some examples. These techniques can be used for any paper project, but my examples will be cards since they are smaller and easier to see the details.
Using negative die cuts is hot hot hot right now! I've fallen for this trend hook, line and sinker! On the following two cards I used thin metal alphabet dies from Papertrey Ink for the sentiments and a My Favorite Things die for the butterflies.
To get the most out of your dies, use the positive and negatives as shown on this 'I Love You' card.
For the following Thanksgiving card I used a Spellbinders circle die to create embellishment windows.
Another hot trend is chevron stripes and My Favorite Things makes a set of chevron dies in two widths. Here I mixed both and placed them on my card vertically. Then I used the die to trace chevron lines in between the patterned paper for stitching.
Polaroids are very popular right now and I'm addicted to them! I've found a way to make these popular little picture frames in an array of sizes by using a set of square Spellbinders Nestabilities dies.
I simply select the size square I want, run it through my die cutter and then cut around the sides with a guillotine style cutter. I don't use any specific measurements, I eyeball it. Following are projects with different size Polaroids.
I really like these tiny Polaroids, how about you? Apparently I really like butterflies too. I just noticed that the first three Polaroid card samples have them! ;)
I hope I've inspired you to pull out your thin metal dies and give some of these trendy techniques a try. If you have any questions or want to share a favorite way to use thin metal dies, please leave a comment. Tomorrow's Technique Week topic is all about washi. See you then!
