A little shabby + a lot of chic = Inspiration

Hi all, it's Ilene here to share some very inspiring stuff with you. I'm sure you'll agree when you're through reading my post :)

Not long ago, I ran across THIS article, that was in the NY Times. Personally, I love the shabby chic look and this little Victorian cottage made me want to go make some art magic. The article was about Sandra Foster, who turned a Catskills hunting cabin into the romantic Victorian cottage she had always wanted. Make sure you take a look at the article for some gorgeous, unbelievable inside pics of the tiny little place.

Here is the magical little place:


Now, let's apply it to scrapbooking. Some time ago, I saw a magical little altered house by Stacy Cohen. I've long loved her work, and this house was not an exception. Stacy is a very talented artist and her BLOG is always full of eye candy. If you're in need of some more inspiration after this article, be sure to check it out! Stacy is also one of the new Prima flower girls, so a huge congrats to her :)

Stacy was gracious enough to share some picture of her gorgeous work of art as well as give us some tips.






And here are some thoughts from Stacy on how she achieved this tiny masterpiece:

I've always had a fascination with dollhouses and miniatures, so when I stumbled upon a plain little wooden house at my local hobby store, I knew it would make the perfect dollhouse. Here’s what I did to create my little “Home Sweet Home”:

*I first painted the entire house with acrylic paint.
*I covered the outside and some of the inside walls with Prima patterned paper.
*I made the bed and the chairs out of the packaging from Prima flowers, then I added little pearls and rhinestones.
*I glued buttons onto the roof and I added Shimmerz paint and glitter to the chimney.
*I made the curtains out of fabric and made the rods out of pieces of wooden dowels.
*I made the bedspread and the pillows out of fabric. I used Fabri-tac to hold them together.
*I made the bed skirt out of lace.
*To make the lamp shade, I took a strip of paper and created tiny pleats, then I glued the ends together. I added a little rod and stuck it into a gold button base.
*I glued a stack of white buttons together to make the bases for the table. For the table tops, I covered chipboard circles with patterned paper.
*I sprayed the downstairs rug and the bedspread fabric (originally beige) with pink Shimmerz Spritz for a little extra color and shimmer.
*I printed out a tiny copy of our family photo and put it in a mini metal frame to hang on the wall.
*I computer printed the "Home Sweet Home" sign and put it in a frame to hang on the downstairs wall.
*I scanned the covers of Creating Keepsakes magazines and printed out tiny versions of them to put in the basket.
*I put a few mini flowers in a vase that I "borrowed" (shhhhhh . . . don't tell) from my daughters' dollhouse.

I can't tell you how much fun I had creating this little house!! I'm ready to move right in!


Don't you love Stacy's idea for how to get those miniature scrapbooking magazines? Oh, I can think of so many ways to apply that technique!

Well, that's it for today's post. I hope you're inspired to try a shabby chic project yourself. You could apply this to a LO, or a mini album, or even your own little altered cottage. Not everyone has a real miniature Victorian Cottage to decorate, but we can all channel that desire into a scrappy project and dream while we do it. Thanks for reading and a HUGE thank you to Stacy for sharing your talent with us! Keep it up girl!