Howzit Joggles Fans!
Leigh here and I’m back to take you on another Wonderland adventure! You may have noticed by now that I love making Alice in Wonderland themed projects and when Joggles sent me their fun new laser-cut masonite Shrines to play with, I knew I just had to make a shrine to Alice! Joggles has an amazing selection of Shrines from basic rectangular boxes in various sizes with or without bases to ones with fancy shaped backs. I decided to use the small one with a Castle silhouette and stage my latest Wonderlandian adventure at the Queen of Hearts’ palace.
On my previous Wonderland adventure, Tea for Two – Tunnel Book, I used Joggles’ classic black and white Alice collage illustrations and made all the tunnel book pages colourful so this time I did the opposite and used one of Joggles coloured Alice collage sheets and went with a vintage monochromatic feel for the Shrine.
Supplies:
Joggles Shrine – Castle Small – 3”W x 9.5”L x 1.25”D
Joggles 9” x 12” Stencil – Punchinella Trio 1
Joggles / Margaret Applin Designs 6″ x 9″ Stencil – Global #1
Joggles Collage Sheets: Alice in Wonderland Collage Sheet 1
Rangers Inkssentials Ink Blending Tool or Rangers Inkssentials Mini Ink Blending Tool
Inkssentials Glossy Accents – 2 fl. oz.
Tim Holtz Distress Ink Pads – Tea Dye, Black Soot, Fired Brick
Inkssentials Nonstick Craft Sheet
Other: pencil; Prismacolor metallic gold fine point pen; DecoColor metallic gold paint broad point pen; paint brush; vintage Alice in Wonderland book; Joulees Mini Playing Cards; chess pieces; Bead Landing Found Objects Chess piece charms; tiny cups and saucer – Ever After High® doll accessories by Mattel; black cardstock; white printer paper; mini wooden Jenga game piece; hot glue gun and glue sticks; copper jewelry findings and tools; Aleene’s metallic gold acrylic paint; Tim Holtz Distress Crackle Paint – Clear Rock Candy; Xyron and 9” permanent adhesive; scissors;
Tutorial
Start out by wiping down the masonite shrine pieces with a damp cloth to remove any left over residue from the laser cutting process and put them aside to dry.
Scan some random pages from an Alice in Wonderland book. I have this lovely vintage Alice in Wonderland book that contains both the original story and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll with original Tenniel illustrations. Have a look on eBay and see if you can pick up a vintage book for your AIW projects too. Otherwise, any Alice story book will do and you can even type up your own text and print it out.
The pages of my Alice in Wonderland book are very old and dark so I lightened my scans by 50% and printed them out onto regular printer paper. You’ll need 3 printed pages for this shrine project. Then run them through a Xyron to add permanent adhesive or you could add them with Scor Tape or Gel Medium.
Adhere one sheet of the printed pages to the vertical masonite shrine pieces and trim with a craft knife.
Turn the vertical masonite pieces over and adhere a second sheet to them and trim. All the text runs horizontally on all the vertical pieces and then I used the 3rd printed page on the two horizontal pieces so the text would still run horizontally.
I decided to pick pages from the book that included the words “Alice” and “Queen” and just randomly applied the pages to the masonite except for the front of the Castle panel. I liked the blank section between paragraphs on one of the pages and made sure that was centered above the window arches. That gave me a space so I could add the title text, “My name is Alice,” which I also cut from one of the pages.
The next step is to age all the pieces of masonite by applying Tea Dye Distress Ink with a blending tool to all the edges while keeping the center areas the lighter (original) printed colour.
Now for all the stenciling fun! I decided the “floor” of my shrine needed to be tiled so I used the Punchinella Trio 1 stencil and Black Soot Distress Ink to add the honeycomb hexagonal pattern to the inside of just the base piece of the shrine.
I then used the Global #1 – 6 x 9 inch stencil and Fired Brick Distress Ink to add the quatrefoil design to all the “outside” panels of the shrine box, as well as just the upper portion of the front of the Castle back panel. I kept the interior of the box plain, decorated with just the text and the tiled floor, because it would have been too busy once I added all the AIW characters.
Don’t forget to also apply Tea Dye and Fired Brick Distress Ink to the edges of the “title” text piece before matting it onto a piece of black cardstock.
To create a quilted pattern feel to all the outside panels, I drew hearts in the intersections of the quatrefoil design on all the panels except for the outer edge sections where the shrine pieces join together. I used the hearts pattern included in the Punchinella Trio 1 stencil to ensure all my hearts were the same size but you can draw yours free hand if you wish.
The next step is to apply Black Soot Distress Ink to the edges of all the shrine pieces. I pretty much do this to all my 3D projects because black gives the project a finished look and also adds a darker edgier vibe which I just love.
Apply metallic gold paint to all the hearts with a fine point paint pen (or use a brush and gold paint) and then apply Inkssentials Glossy Accents for a glossy 3D finish.
While waiting for the glossy hearts to dry, get all the Wonderland characters ready. First I ran the whole collage sheet through my Xyron to add permanent adhesive and then I fussy cut the characters leaving a narrow white border around each one. This collage set has the tiered cake in 2 sizes and I decided to cut up the smaller of the two and use the Cheshire Cat, the teapot with card guards, and the tiny pocket watch as separate elements as well. Adhere all the images to black cardstock and fussy cut them, again leaving a narrow black border. Once inside the shrine, all the characters are 3D so the black cardstock gives the pieces extra strength and also makes them stand out better from the background.
Back to the shrine…once the glossy hearts have dried, edge all the “front edges” of the shrine box pieces in metallic gold with a broad point paint pen. You don’t need to edge the pieces where the panels all join together. TIP: Use a fine point paint pen to do the hard to reach areas like the corners of the arches, etc. I also painted both sides of the Castle turrets gold.
Now its time to assemble everything!
Apply Aleene’s Fast Grab Glue to the panels and construct the frame of the box. To make sure the frame dries straight, dry fit it to the back panel and adjust with your fingers to ensure the sides line up nicely with the back and keep hold of it for a minute or so to let the glue set. Then you can carefully let go but leave the frame to dry properly for about another 5-10 minutes. Once the box frame has set nicely, apply glue to one side and adhere it to the Castle back panel and let that dry too.
Once the shrine is assembled, apply Clear Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint to the front edges of the box frame and both sides of the metallic gold castle turrets. I also applied crackle paint to the “My name is Alice” title text as well. Put everything aside to dry and return about 30 minutes later to admire all the yummy cracks that formed. I was dismayed to discover that the crackle paint didn’t adhere to my gold turrets. it just flaked off so I painted over the gold paint pen with Aleene’s metallic gold acrylic paint and re-applied the crackle paint…Success!
The crackle paint altered my title text panel a bit more than anticipated too, but I totally love the extra vintage quality it gave to it. The crackle effect adds a sense of mystery because you can only see what the text says depending on the angle it’s viewed from. I tried to get some photos of the effect to show you what I mean but, trust me, you can definitely read the text better in person. The title was then adhered in place with glue.
Now its time to add all the elements to the shrine. I started out by adhering the Queen of Hearts to the back panel with a dab of glue just on her left side and placed her so that the right side of the image bends and curves across the back corner. I then made my own set of flying playing cards to look like the ones in the book by adhering tiny Joulees Boutique playing cards together, mounting them on black cardstock, and fussy cutting them. I adhered the playing cards to the left side of the back panel and curved them to make them look like they’re spilling forward out of the shrine.
Alice takes center stage and to make her 3D and appear free standing, I adhered a mini Jenga wood game piece to the back of the image. I then adhered her in place just slightly off center to ensure the Mad Hatter didn’t obscure her view with his tea cup and also ensure that the Queen of Hearts gets to scowl over her shoulder…this did put the Queen in quite a mood, LOL! I love to use and alter game pieces in my art so using the Jenga piece was the perfect, yet hidden, touch for me but you can make your own mount from cardstock or scrap pieces of wood…whatever you have on hand will do the trick.
I then adhered the Mad Hatter, White Rabbit, Teapot, and Cheshire Cat to the front of the Shrine.
Of course, I had to use real chess pieces on my Alice Shrine and dug out 2 black Rooks, aka castles, and a Bishop from my stash. I blinged them up by enhancing their details with a metallic gold paint pen.
The Rook chess pieces transformed into a stand for my Shrine. You’ll notice in the photo that the Rooks are positioned along the back edge of the Shrine instead of centered on the base. The reason for this is the taller Castle back panel makes the Shrine top heavy and if I’d glued the Rooks in the center the Shrine would have just fallen over backwards. I adhered the Rooks to the base with hot glue.
The Bishop chess piece joined the party inside the Shrine along with another tiny playing card, a Jack of Hearts.
I decorated the top of the Shrine with two metal chess piece charms, a gold Knight and a copper Pawn, and two tiny plastic cups and a saucer I stole from my Maddy Hatter Ever After High® doll by Mattel. All were adhered in place with a dab of hot glue.
The finishing touch to my Alice Shrine was the Mad Hatter’s pocket watch. I used copper jump rings and black/copper chain to attach the watch to the Hatter image. I used copper instead of brass to tie in with the copper chess Pawn charm I used to decorate the top of the Shrine.
Here’s a look at all the details. I love how my Alice Shrine turned out!
I hope you’ve enjoying seeing how it all came together and that I’ve inspired you to create your own Shrines in whatever theme you like… although you simply can’t go wrong if you decide to take an adventure down the rabbit hole, too ;0)
Thanks for stopping by Joggles today and have a great Stamping weekend!
Leigh S-B
The Sharpie Domino Queen
11 Comments
Oh my, I love every single thing about this! I think is is why Joogles is my very favorite site. I only wish I had the talent and money to have everything. I love watching all the You Tube videos. I can’t get enough enjoyment from all of you.
Thank You for sharing all of your magnificent talents. I admire you
Susan
Thank you Susan, I’m pleased that you love Joggles and are enjoying mine and my fellow team mates projects :0)
Totally fabulous! What an awesome project idea, I just love all things Alice. Thank you so much for sharing your process and your talent.
Thank you Faye, I’m thrilled my Shrine is being enjoyed by a fellow Alice fan :0)
This is beautiful. I love all the details.
Thank you so much Patricia :0)
Thank you Patricia :0)
Love this! So many wonderful ideas here.
Thank you Sue :0)
Wow Leigh…love love your Alice shrine and all the cute characters, I can see how much work you put into creating it….fabulous!
Thank you so much Val :0)