Loosely Watercoloured Butterflies

This card was a commission, the client wanted a specific theme and message. It took me a while to come up with the design but once I had the idea, the execution was fairly easy and it ended up being one of my favourite cards. 

The colouring is done with only two shades of distress inks, Wilted Violet and Peacock Feathers, for both the background and the butterflies. I inked a little bit of my glass mat directly from the ink pad (you can use an actual watercolor palette or an acrylic block), watered a piece of watercolor paper and then, with a very wet brush, picking up the colour from the glass mat and freely applied it onto my paper. I didn’t have a specific pattern to follow but I left distinctive areas of each colour on the watercolour paper. Once it dried, I simply used butterfly dies in different sizes and cut from random places in the paper.

For the background, I cut a piece of wood grain finish cardstock and blended the same colours I had used for the butterflies, then I spritzed a bit of water and let it dry. The sentiment is a die cut from Penny Black, to get the thick effect, I cut about 3 to 4 pieces in thick cardstock and one on a shimmery white cardstock for the top and glued them together. Note: you have to wait for these layers to dry well before adding it to the project. 

There is no right or wrong for placing the butterflies, but for some reason, I thought a landscape layout would be cool for this design. Besides, it left me more options to locate the sentiment. I added the main panel to a A4 card using double sided foam tape.

Once all the elements were on the card, the final touch was to add a few clear drops embellishments for extra dimension and texture.

As you can see it is fairly simple, and you can use this design for several themes, not just butterflies, but with pretty much any die cut you’d like.

I hope you like this project and if so, I invite you to leave a comment and share this post. 

Cheers!

“To practice any art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow.”_ Kurt Vonnegut.