Book Review – Parchment Perforating Guide by Tina Cox

The Parchment Perforating Guide is a Clarity book, Artwork by Tina Cox – it focuses on Gridwork using the Groovi Straight Border plate number 1, but has a huge amount of help and advice for beginners to parchment craft in a very clear, step by step approach.

The Groovi Straight Border Plate 1 has 5 basic gridwork patterns ready to use.

 

In this book there are 15 ‘easy to make’ card designs  ending with a final big project bringing all the skills you have learned at the end. The instructions are easy to follow and give you a list of the equipment you will need for each project.

A very handy spiral bound small book 6” x 6” . I like that it sits flat on your craft table and the size means that it won’t take up much space.

In summary this is a  great little book for beginners, a useful size, step by step clear instructions and photographs and loads of beautiful projects to work through making this a fantastic buy for anyone wanting to learn how to create decorative edgings for their Groovi projects.

 

Freehand Embossing in Parchment Craft by Amanda Yeh

Freehand Embossing in Parchment Craft

Here is a closer look at the beautiful new book from Amanda Yeh called Freehand Embossing. There are ‘step by step’ fully illustrated guides to the projects and very detailed illustrated guidance to embossing.

The book starts from basics “how to emboss a single line” and then works through a further 12 lessons to improve your embossing. These skills can then be used when constructing the beautiful 3D projects patterns in the back of the book.

 

There are beautiful boxes, pretty cards, exquisite bookmarks and a dress and jacket model plus mini bags.

Amanda Yeh is an incredibly talented designer and this beautiful book is a great addition to her series of books on 3D parchment craft.

NEW Parchment Craft book for 2016 – Wonderful Lace by Miki Green

Wonderful Lace by Miki Green

Wonderful lace is a fabulous book from Miki Green packed full of brand new designs for cards, ornamental mats or doily and a beautiful fan.  I will add a few photographs of the projects to give you and idea of the gorgeous projects Miki has designed for us to make.

There are 22 projects and they are all illustrated with clear instructions, Miki encourages everyone to have a go at her patterns from beginners to the more experienced. This is definitely a book for parchment crafters who like grid-work but there are also plenty of designs that require embossing.

Delightful Gifts in Parchment Craft by Amanda Yeh

DELIGHTFUL GIFTS IN PARCHMENT CRAFT

Amanda Yeh is well know for her 3D parchment craft projects. Her latest book is a lovely collection of gift projects for you to make in parchment. The most important part of Amanda’s books is that she gives you plenty of ‘step by step’ photographs, so if you are a bit worried about taking on a challenging 3D project you will be getting lots of visual help from the masses of photos in the book.

The instructions are clear, starting right from exactly what you will need to start the project. The photos above show the components for the beautiful baby blue lace up shoes. The photo below shows part of the construction of a delicate tiny lace umbrella or parasol.

Altogether there are 6 shoe designs, 5 umbrella designs and 1 dress design, all with full colour ‘step by step’ photo illustrations. I especially like the little baby girl shoes in pink – they are absolutely gorgeous and I am definitely going to have a go making these. There are 64 pages including all the patterns.

 

Simple Treasures by Linda Williams

If you are new to parchment craft Simple Treasures is a brilliant book to start you off. It is a bright, vibrant book, very inspiring to look at. As with all Linda’s books, they are so beautiful I just want to sit down and drink them in. She has paid great attention to detail of both design and instructions, making parchment craft a very accessible craft to everyone. There are tips for each project and information at the beginning on how to use parchment craft products such as Sticky Ink.

Linda says in the foreward that it is aimed to appeal to both beginners and seasoned parchment crafters. All the projects are graded in levels of easiness, (this is explained at the beginning of the book), I think if you were a beginner and started with the easiest projects and worked your way through to the  more challenging projects you will learn a lot about parchment craft along the way and have a lot of fun doing so.

There are 19 projects for you to try, this book is great value.

Kannikar Sukseree’s new book ‘Borders and Decorations’

This is the third book in Kannikar’s series ‘A Classic Collection’. It is an extremely useful book packed with 200 designs for borders, decorations, motifs and embellishments. Kannikar and her team of creators and designers have created a fantastic collection for parchment crafters to dip into and use for cards and many other projects.

The third book has been written with the information gained from feedback on books 1 and 2, they have designed these patterns to be made with the minimum of tools. You will only need embossing tools and a few perforating tools as there is very little gridwork involved.

The patterns in this book are for all abilities both beginners and experienced parchers will find something to suit them. There is a section at the front describing the tools and equipment you will need, and then there are three pages of quick guides to tracing, embossing, cutting, working on a grid etc.

 

There are quite a few pages of ideas for completed projects but it is very much a book of borders and decorative edges and embellishments, so you choose your own centres whether a photo, drawing or parchment craft work.  All the patterns have to be enlarged by 140% on a photocopier to obtain their true size, but you can alter this to suit your requirements.  Altogether this is a fabulous book that has endless opportunities to make your own parchment craft projects really special and unique. 116 pages.

A New Parchment Craft Book ‘Lace Desk’ by Miki Green

 

This is a fabulous book, as usual Miki has packed it with a huge number of projects. There are projects for cards, fans, wall hangings, pictures and the patterns are all very well laid out and easy to understand.

 

Some of the larger designs look quite complicated but there are plenty of easier projects, these two are lovely. This is definitely a book for all those who love whitework.

There are 34 projects,64 pages in the book.

 

 

Amanda Yeh’s New Parchment Craft Book “A Bride’s Dream”

Amanda Yeh’s new book “A Bride’s Dream” is a collection of beautiful miniature bridal gowns made from A4 parchment paper and decorated with embossed and cutwork designs with gems to give a glamourous touch.

There are six bridal gown designs for you to make, they all have step by step illustrated instructions and a full list of Pergamano items you will need to complete a project.

 The gridwork patterns are at the back of the book and are all very clear and detailed, with extra instructions making it easy for you to transfer the pattern onto parchment.

 A fabulous book with some beautiful 3D projects with excellent instructions. There are 64 pages and the book is in English.

Brilliant 3D Parchment Craft by Amanda Yeh

I am sure that most people will be amazed to see the wonderful, intricate parchment craft designs in this book, Brilliant 3D Parchment Craft. Amanda Yeh makes these designs completely accessible to those of us who might not normally consider such a challenging project by including fully illustrated ‘step by step’ instructions. I do find patterns a lot easier to make up when I can see the steps in a photograph.

This is a beautiful book with many 3D projects including:  a carriage which you can see above, cups, teapots, a pram, a tricycle, a birthday cake and goblet. If you enjoy gridwork and want to have a go at 3D designs this is a good book to get. The instructions and patterns are very  clear, there are 64 pages.

Essential Tools and Equipment to start Parchment Craft for Beginners

I often receive emails from people who don’t have a parchment tutor in their area and don’t know what basic tools and equipment they need to buy to get started.  I have written this guide to help those people find the essential items and information they need.

I am not an expert, but I know how daunting and complicated parchment craft can seem without knowing the basics. Once you have mastered these basics though, you will find out what a fantastic craft this is and create your own beautiful lacework and embossing. You will certainly never get bored, it is one of the most rewarding crafts I have tried, as  Pergamano themselves say – “Endlessly Challenging.” It is also very addictive – so be warned!

BUYING PARCHMENT CRAFT EQUIPMENT

A lot of craft shops have closed down in the last few years. If you don’t have a shop near you selling parchment craft equipment the best option is to buy on the internet. A few years ago many people were  worried about buying online, these days however, things have improved and you will often find the best prices and deals online. Also ordering on the internet isn’t as hard as it used to be and there are many safeguards to protect your information.  A shop that specialises in parchment craft should be able to offer advice on what tools are available, so phone them up before you buy to answer any questions you may have.

LOOKING FOR A TUTOR

If you are looking for a parchment craft tutor visit the website for ‘The Association of Parchment Crafters’ where they have a list of tutors in different locations. Some tutors even offer Skype tutoring now, (Skype is a free internet video chat service) which means that wherever you are in the world you can still find a tutor.

GETTING STARTED – WHAT YOU NEED

If you can’t find a tutor near you there are starter kits available from the two main manufacturers of parchment craft equipment ParchCraft Australia(PCA) and Pergamano.

STARTER KITS

The Pergamano Starter Kit is a simple kit with a couple of tools, A5 parchment paper, and embossing mat, a dorso crayon, a white gel pen and full instructions, everything you need to get you started. There are several beautiful patterns in the kit and should only take a few hours to complete. This kit makes a great present and allows a beginner to try out parchment craft without spending a lot of money on equipment.

The Parchcraft Australia (PCA) Bold Starter Kit contains three perforating tools (Unibold, Bold MiniStamp Edge and a Bold Quad), White Gel Pen, A4 Parchment Paper, Mini Perforating Mat, Instructions and a Pattern to make. PCA also have an Embossing Starter Kit available and a Fine Gauge Starter Kit.

Unlike the Pergamano kit, these kits only have one pattern, but they are thoroughly worthwhile and will help teach you the basics of parchment craft.

MY RECOMMENDATIONS TO START PARCHMENT CRAFT

If you don’t want to buy a starter kit,  I would suggest that you would need the following basic tools to start you off:

For Tracing:

• Parchment paper 150g
• White pencil or mechanical pencil and white leads
• Tinta white ink and a mapping pen or white gel pen

For Embossing:

• Embossing mat, small ball tool and large ball tool
• Tumble drier cloth to make embossing tools glide easier

For Perforating:

• Perforating mat
• 1 needle tool
• 2 needle tool
• 4 needle tool

For Cutting:

• Parchment craft scissors or perga cutters ( they have to be the proper ones for parchment craft- very fine)

Note * There are also 2 and 4 needle tools that will cut the parchment for a quick finish: PCA Mini Stamp Edge/Stamp Edge and Pergamano 2Split/ 4Split

ACTION PACK OF PERGAMANO TOOLS

There are plenty of other tools but these will get you started, there is an Action pack of Pergamano tools which includes a range of embossing and perforating tools and a mapping pen. Although this kit is more expensive than the others, it could be seen as a good long-term investment if you are serious about getting into parchment craft.

MY SUGGESTED BOOKS FOR BEGINNERS

I know when I started parchment craft I bought a pattern which was beautiful but rather advanced for a beginner and I found it a bit disheartening because I didn’t really know where to start. After a while I bought a Parchment Craft book by Janet Wilson which explained a lot of the techniques and had some beautiful projects to get me started.

This was one of my early attempts at parchment craft from Janet Wilson’s book ‘Parchment Craft’

There are some really good books  available now for beginners: The Techniques of Parchment Craft by Pergamano are small handbooks; there are 7 volumes each one concentrating on different aspects or techniques such as embossing , colouring with pencils, painting, gridwork etc. Below  is Volume 5, which has to be my favourite which concentrates on coloured pencil techniques – I think that the projects in this book are outstanding, here is one of my attempts at one of the patterns.

PARCHMENT CRAFT -THE TECHNIQUES  (7 VOLUMES)

THE HANDBOOK OF PARCHMENT CRAFT BASICS BY TINA COX AND LINDA WILLIAMS

The Handbook of Parchment Craft Basics (shown below) is also a great book to start you off, techniques are explained and there are plenty of up to date designs from Tina Cox and Linda Williams. It has 19 projects (all cards) for you to work on, they all have a really fresh, bright look and ‘step by step’ instructions on how to complete them. The techniques of tracing, embossing, perforating and cutting are covered in depth making this an ideal book for a beginner. There is also sections on using Multi-Grids and Stamping on parchment , as well as stamping techniques there are sections on how to colour the image with Perga Colours, Perga Liners, Dorso Crayons.

TINA COX’S DIDI CARDS AND BEGINNERS TECHNIQUE GUIDE

Tina Cox has also produced a beautiful beginners pack which includes patterns and a large techniques guide to get you started with parchment craft. These are her designs below and they are absolutely stunning. Tina has also made sure that the instructions for each design are clear and easy to follow.

CHRISTINE COLEMAN’S INSTRUCTIONAL DVDS FOR PARCHMENT CRAFT

If you just want a more interactive learning experience why not consider getting an instructional parchment craft DVD.  Christine Coleman has a range of DVDs available: A Beginners Guide to Parchment Craft, Painting on Parchment, Gridwork, Colouring with Pencils and Finishing Touches all these DVDs have over an hour of step by step tuition and demonstration leading you through each project, each DVD has four or five projects to improve your skills.

The Grid and Lace Work DVD uses the PCA Grids and Tools

Here are two cards that I made from the ‘Beginners’ DVD and the ‘Painting’ DVD.  The DVD is a fantastic way to learn at your own pace, you get to see an expert demonstrating and you can just rewind if you miss a bit!

The ‘Thank You’ card: The parchment is slightly coloured on the back of the parchment along the edge with oil pastels.  White Tinta ink and mapping pen was used to trace the pattern. The petals and leaves were embossed and gold Tinta ink was added to the ferns. The edge was embossed with Ball Tools/PCA Sun Tool and the edge was perforated and cut with parchment scissors.

The Rose is painted onto parchment using Tinta inks and is set into an aperture card with a simple grid work edging.

I hope that this will inspire you to get started on your first project.  Everyone I talk to agrees that when you are in the midst of a parchment craft project the hours slip by as it is such an absorbing hobby.If you have any questions Just leave me a message below.  If you are an experienced parcher please let us know how you got started in parchment craft.