The girl with a Pearl for Happy Daze

As soon as I saw this stamp set I had to have it!!!
I love the painting by Vermeer.

I started by colouring the wooden box with distress stain in broken china, when dry I painted on Picket fence crackle paint.

I stamped  my image on to tissue paper with coffee archival ink and adhered it to the box with a glue stick

I tinted the image with distress markers scribbled on to my craft mat, spritzed, then painted on with a brush to give a nice soft colour. 

I glued on some scraps of lace with glossy accents. then inked the bottom right corner with versamark ink to create a sticky surface for my frantage embossing powders.
They are designed to be heated from below so you need to start with a thin layer and add more while its still hot to build up the layers on a 3d item like this.

If you aren't happy with the areas covered with the embossing powder, brush off before heating.
Because I used a small inkpad I found I had a lot of harsh lines, so softened them this way.

I worked my way around the sides of the box and highlighted areas on the top of the box with the gold powder - I love the way it beads when you heat it slightly or on areas like the lace - you could brush away the extra powder to have a more beaded effect.

To finish off I added distress stickles and added a philosophy tag  embellished with seam binding coloured with the left over distress marker spritzed stain from earlier.

Here's a few more pics for you....

Hugs'n'snogs,
Julie xx