book review Layered Impressions

A couple Mondays ago, after stocking up on fruit and veggies at the farmer's market, I spent a blissful hour in our big Barnes & Noble (book store), parked in a chair in front of the craft shelves. Found a few books I liked but the one I brought home was Layered Impressions by Katie Kendrick.

I LOVE this book. The projects are everything I like - a bit grungy, use a lot of stuff I already have on hand, plus recyclable things like cardboard. They're useful, for the most part. They're a bit slapped together without a lot of fuss for making sure corners match and that sort of thing, so you sort of can't go wrong.

They also leave a lot of room for making them your own. Some folks like to go to a class and come home with a project that looks exactly like the instructor's class sample. And that's fine - for them. But I'm the one who has to use blue when the instructions say green, or make mine 6" when it should be 8". Whatever, I'm always tinkering with the way it should be, and Katie's projects totally lend themselves to that. 

Right now I'm about in the middle of making the white wall piece in the second image. It's made from corrugated cardboard, joint compound (that you seal up drywall seams with!), dried flowers, old beads - all sorts of fun stuff. Slapping the joint compound all over it was a blast. I just this minute finished painting some melted beeswax over my little flower panel, the part hanging down with the flower on it. My first time doing the beeswax thing which I've admired from afar for quite a while and it looks cool!

Then I'm gonna make the 3rd image and then the 4th. So I have several weeks of projects planned out from this book and there are several more that appeal to me. If these pictures appeal to you, go get the book! I don't buy many art books because I've found that I like one or two things in them and then they just sit on the shelf. This one is practically dog-eared already from all the paging thru I've been doing.

Thanks for a great book, Katie!