Bella Blvd Studio Blog: Friday Sketch: Cards

Who doesn't love a good sketch? It helps to take the guesswork out of the page and/or card design, but still allows you to put your own spin on things just be turning the sketch or altering it here and there. A few times a month, we'll be bringing you a new sketch, and showing you a few takes on the sketch by our designers. Today, we have our first sketch for February, just for card makers. I asked one of our own talented designers, Diana Fisher, to create a sketch for us based off of a previously shared card by card designer Ashley Marcu.

Original card - by card designer Ashley Marcu.

“I Love You” card, by Diana Fisher.

I love Valentine's Day cards! You can't help but smile when creating with hearts and mushy love sentiments. Bella Blvd has a few collections that are perfect for love cards, and I gravitated to Love & Marriage and the Kiss Me collections for this card.

Supplies:
Kiss Me: Just Write Journaling Stickers, Alpha+Bits, Border & Cute Cuts; Love and Marriage: Esther Fleming Floral; Ciao Chip Elements: Stars & Hearts

“So Handsome” card, by Ashley Marcu.

I thought it would be fun to create a card for a guy with this sketch. To do this, I kept the card in masculine colors and tilted certain elements to keep it playful. I also added a pop of orange with the decorative tape for some fun contrast.

Supplies:
Snapshots: Free Time, Hurry Up; Daily Chevies: Chevy Bell Pepper, Arrows Gulf; Play Date: Alpha+Bits; Christmas Countdown: Tabs; Designer Tape: Gray Chevron, Orange Stripe

“Forever Young” card, by Laurie Schmidlin.

I love this sketch! I thought it was perfect to create a card for my son! I chose a couple of coordinating Max papers, added on a Candid Card, and embellished with some stickers.

Supplies:
Max: Science Fair, Trinkets, Borders, Treasures & Text, Candid Cards

“Love Ya” card, by Shellye McDaniel.

When interpreting a sketch, I generally keep the majority of the design the same and then pick out a focal point to make my design unique. For this sketch, I chose the area where the 'sentiment' is to go and went with a cluster of embellishments, which also boasted the card's sentiment. I am a big fan of Side "B" papers, so I stepped outside of my comfort zone and went with the fun "Unlimited Text" paper as the main background, instead of a smaller pattern. By building up the cluster of embellishments with foam adhesive, it added a natural shadow and helped to bring it in focus against the busier background.

Supplies:
Molly: Paper Pieces, Trinkets, Unlimited Text, Borders; Family Forever: Borders; Button Market: Outdoors; High Five Alpha Stickers: Gulf; Ciao Chip Elements: Stars & Hearts

“Remember This” card, by Kathy Martin.

Years ago when I’d used a sketch for making a card the outcome looked quite similar to the sketch. Today that’s changed and my projects usually look nothing like the sketch. I think over the years, with lots of practice, I’ve been able to be more creative with an inspiration piece and to make it my own.