Today’s contributor is Lisa from Grey Luster Girl. All posts written by Lisa for Make It & Love It can be found HERE.
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Hello everyone! Lisa from Grey Luster Girl here sharing an easy way to make your own watercolor typography. Have you seen those gorgeous watercolor art pieces with the fun sayings inside? You can buy them for a pretty penny or you could make your own. I was surprised with how easy it was with the right tools! I purchased a Silhouette Curio for Christmas this last year, but I have not used it much. The few times I did, it felt very unfamiliar. It sat in my crafting workshop for a few months untouched. Then one Sunday, I was inspired. I was listening in a church class about trials that we face and how to handle them. The teacher quoted a scripture passage that said “Give Me This Mountain”. It spoke to me and was a help to a particular problem that I was trying to solve. I wanted to display the words in my home so that they could continue to inspire me. I had in my mind an image of a mountain with the phrase inside. I tried sketching it out but it just wasn’t going to cut it. I needed the help of the right tools to turn this idea into a work of art.
Sometimes the right tools are just what you need to take a project from homemade to just right. Once I got the hang of it, I couldn’t stop making more and more watercolor typography art!
Supplies:
The first thing you need to do is design your image. When you plug in your Silhouette Curio, it will bring up the Silhouette Curio design mat and page. I designed a simple mountain by using the polygon tool.
Once you have your background shape, you can add in your words. Type in each word separately so that you can arrange them within the shape. I used the font Heather for the typography of my Give Me This Mountain art.
Arrange the words within your shape getting as close to the edge as you can.
Now group everything together. Set your paper size (5×7 in my case) and center the image on the page. Before we send the design to our Silhouette Curio, you need to prepare your paper on the mat. Cut your watercolor paper to size.
Because we will be embossing (or debossing in our case), we need our Curio mat to be at a thickness of 5. You can look at the little numbers on the left of the Curio mats and put on two number 2’s and one number 1. Place the paper on the Silhouette Curio mat. You need to align it with the arrows going vertically and horizontally. Imagine an invisible line going from arrow to arrow. Place the plastic material fasteners alongside your watercolor paper to hold it in place.
Now this is the part that had me most confused when I first started working with the Curio. How do I load the mat?! Contrary to the Silhouette CAMEO, you load the mat on the Curio before you turn the machine on. Stick the mat all the way through the machine so that it comes out the back end and then push the on button.
With the machine on and loaded, we can finish up our design. Put the fine embossing tool in the left side of the Curio blade carrier. Click the emboss setting then Emboss/Deboss then adjust cut settings. Click the fine embossing tool setting in the cut menu and send to the Curio.
It is really hard to see on the computer screen but you get a nice debossed image that will be your watercolor typography guide. Look carefully, harken back to the days when you looked at the those eye puzzle books and an image jumped out. Now you see it, don’t you!
Once we start adding some watercolor you will be able to see the debossing better. I used my daughters watercolor palette on some and regular watercolors on another. They both worked great so use whatever you have! Can you see those lines now?
Just keep filling around the lines with your watercolor. Be careful not to get it too watery or your coloring may bleed into your letters. I have never taken any watercolor classes or anything so using the Curio to outline my design was super helpful and made it look like I knew what I was doing!
Once I did one image I just couldn’t stop! It was so fun to do and so easy to make a beautiful hand watercolored piece of art! I thought I might as well do one for the next upcoming holiday so I did one for the 4th of July.
I also made another design from a little saying that just tickles me when ever I hear it. 10 points for anyone that can guess where it is from. I will give you a hint… “How are we holding together? Bubblegum and a wish”!
So now you have the skills to make your own easy watercolor typography! I hope you will share your creations with me!
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Creating artwork for your home does not require an art degree or Picasso’s talent! You can create beautiful pieces of custom art that you will adore. Check out some of these great DIY artwork project ideas:
Knock-Off “Darling, I Love You” Sign
Eiffel Tower Silhouette — Pebble Display
Make One Of A Kind Work Of Art Using Sharpies!
Hi, I’m Ashley—the DIY-enthusiast behind this crazy blog!
