Paper Folding

A few years ago, my mother in law showed me a technique she had learned to do when making cards.  It is a paper folding technique called Iris Folding.  It sounded difficult but once I did it, I found out how easy it was to do.  I wanted to share a card I made recently using Iris Folding.

 

You begin by tracing a pattern onto a piece of card stock.  In this case, I used a teddy bear.  I used my light box to trace it.  Once finished, I carefully cut it out using a craft knife.  That left the shape of the bear as an outline.  Some patterns you use for this are available online.  They have the shape and the recipe for the paper to use.  It will tell you if you need 2 ,3, 4 or more different designs of paper as well as have a numbering system to guide you in your placement of these sheets.  Basically, it is simply cutting or tearing strips of paper to fit the space and folding it to give the nice edges.  

 

In this close up you can see I used 4 designs of paper that coordinated.  You will follow the number pattern (1, 2, 3, and so on) to lay the folded strips down.  Although you might be tempted to do all on one design of paper at a time, you will not achieve the spiral effect you should.  You must go in numerical order to have it turn out right.  You can also see the folds.  The strips are adhered to the back of the design as you lay them down using ordinary every day scotch tape.  I added a few gems to my teddy to give him eyes.  In the center, it is your choice to either leave it open allowing the card stock you attach this to to show through or you may do what I did which was put a piece of paper over the hole to close it.  The gem is just for added decoration.   Since the bear is a little bulky when finished due to the layers of paper and tape, I like to attach it to another piece of card stock using either eyelets or brads.  This piece you attach it to could be the front of your card or another piece of card stock you will be attaching to your card.  

Many of the designs need a piece of card stock that measures 4 1/4" x 5".  This is the size of my normal cards so it basically will become the front.  I added glitter glue dots to spruce it up a bit.  I promise that even though I have probably confused you, it really is a simple technique and easy to learn.  You can always Google "Iris Folding".  There are sites with free patterns available as well as instruction.  I bet you could even find a video on YouTube if you look.

Thanks for stopping by today.  See you tomorrow.