A Bird in a Gilded Cage

April 28, 2013

A Bird in a Gilded Cage

I thought I would share my post from Friday for It's a Creative World.

As you remember the blog is back and you really do need to check it out as the girls are posting something every weekend and there is always such variety over there. Do go and visit.

So this was my project for April ... and very different for me too.

I admit I am an impulse shopper and that was certainly true when I saw this chipboard bird and cage.

It didn't look like this, obviously - it was just plain chipboard.

I had no idea what I would do with it, but it was just so cute I wanted to have it and play around with it.

And it just goes to show what you can achieve with cheap embellishments.

I covered the cage with walnut stain and then different colours of distress inks. I added green as I wanted the cage to look like it was old and worn and had a sort of patina to it.

I added some gold glitter in places as I wanted a sort of tarnished gold look – not all over shiny and glitzy. I guess I was going for the bird in a gilded cage look.

The bird was covered with patterned paper and then I used distress inks and a text stamp on the top and inked the edges.

I added stickles round the heart and for the bird’s eye

I had a small ivy wreath I had bought a long time ago. I had hoped it would work for my dolls’ house, but the leaves were just too big and out of scale. I carefully unravelled the wreath and then wound it round parts of the cage, using glossy accents to stick it in place as the wire it was made of wasn’t really strong enough to hold it.

I then took apart a necklace I had bought from Primark several months ago. It was made of an old gold colour and had huge leaves on it in an old gold filigree pattern. It was bought purely to take apart and was just what I needed for this project. At £1.50 it yielded not only the chain but a total of 18 leaves – plenty for numerous projects.