Gothic

In my international tip-in exchange group, Mel´s theme for my March/April pages was "Gothic". 

First I did some brainstorming - what came to my mind were black roses, ravens, fog, Gothic architecture, melancholy, and a dark, black/green/purple colour scheme.

Mel wanted her pages to be made on old book pages in the size of 10 x 15 cm, without a margin.

So I had a look at my old books and found one with German songs. I had to cut the edges to get the right size, and I had to be very careful with these brittle papers.

My first idea was a Poe themed spread, and I´ve made a digital collage with images from Finecrafted Designs that I printed on the old book pages and then lightly coloured it with coloured pencils. I was thrilled about the result!

For my second spread, I wanted to use a couple of rubber stamps in the themes of melancholic women and Gothic architecture. I stamped them on dyed book pages in appropriate colours, then collaged them on the song book pages, and finally coloured in with watersoluble crayons to hold it all together. The song title on the right page ends with "in dunkler Nacht" (in the dark night) which was just perfect for my purpose, so I highlighted these words. Finally I added a quote on the left page.

My two tip-in spreads will be in the mail to England tomorrow!