Destination Inspiration - Using Distress Stains

Hello everyone, Anne here and it is my pleasure today to host our regular feature - Destination Inspiration here at A Vintage Journey. 

 I am going back to basics using only Distress Stains (and a little stamping and embellishing).  I love using Distress Stains, they are my go to choice for colouring.  They are so versatile and easy to use, the colours stay true and they can be used in a whole variety of ways.  If you saw my post last Friday (here) you will see that I used them for watercolouring, so I am not repeating that technique here.  

In this tutorial I have concentrated on three techniques for using Distress Stains to create your tag bases.

Technique 1 - Brayering & Spritzing with Distress Stains

Take a tag, I used a white one (cut from Ranger Speciality Paper), dab some Distress Stain directly onto your mat (I use a glass one just for ease), take a brayer and roll it lightly through the Distress Stain.

Run the brayer up and down the tag, picking up more DS if necessary.  The brayering gives an uneven and very light coating on the tag, as you can see below.  Cover as much or as little as you wish.  On this sample I was happy with rolling back and forth twice.  You could use several colours here and if you do I recommend that you do them one by one, drying thoroughly each time, so as not to muddy your colours. Dry the tag thoroughly. 

Take a stencil, I have used Tim's doily stencil and place it over the dry tag.  Take some of the Distress Stain and put it in a mini spritzer bottle (Tim does a demo showing how to do this easily HERE) and lightly spritz over the stencil.  You can tape the stencil down if you wish but mine was lying quite flat and I just spritzed gently, ensuring I covered the whole area.

Carefully lift the stencil and you should have a nice covering over your tag.  Dry with a heat tool or just leave to air dry.  Some of the colour may run a little, but I am quite happy with that.

Finish the tag off by adding stamping and/or your favourite embellishments.  I used Tim's Frameworks trellis die and cut it the from another tag I created from mopping up left over stains.  I never waste any of the lovely stains! The vintage seam binding was also coloured with Distress Stains.

Technique 2 - Stenciling with Stains

For this technique take your favoured colours of Distress Stains and dab them onto your mat.  I used Wild Honey, Peacock Feathers, Peeled Paint and Salty Ocean.  Take a tag and spritz it very, very lightly with water.  I find this easier than spritzing at the next stage, with this particular technique, but the choice is yours.

Drag your tag (in this case I used a Manila one) through the stains in the same way you would do for Tim's wrinkle free technique, moving and tipping the tag to let some of the colours run.  Dry it and drag it through again until you are happy with the covering and dry thoroughly.  Remember to mop up any remaining stain from your mat onto another tag.

Dab some Distress Stain onto your mat and place a stencil of your choice over the tag.  Take a sponge (I used a simple make up one), dab it lightly into the stain and then dab gently through the stencil where you want it to show.

Carefully lift the stencil and dry the tag thoroughly.  With this technique it is best to dry it with a heat tool so the colour does not 'seep' further into the tag.  I love the effect of the DS stenciling - hard dabbing creates strong colour and lighter dabbing creates a ghost of colour.

I wanted to create a seaweed effect on my tag so I took a second stencil, some Peeled Paint Distress Stain and again dabbed it through the stencil, where I wanted the seaweed to be.

Carefully lift off the stencil and dry the tag thoroughly.  Don't forget to clean off your stencil or it may transfer unwanted ink onto your next project.

Now decorate your tag in your chosen way.  I wanted to use my favourite seahorse from the Blueprints set.  I added a starfish from the mini Blueprints set and some more grasses which I cut from the Movers and Shapers Mini Branch and Leaf die. 

Technique 3 - Wrinkle Technique using Stains

Many of you will use and be very familiar with Tim's wrinkle free technique but Tim also did a 'wrinkle' technique although I have not seen it used very often.  This involves screwing up a tag really tightly, in this case I used a manila one. You can lightly spray the tag with water to make the job easier but I used the tag dry in this case, as I wanted fairly big creases.

Unfold the tag and smooth it out.  If you pre-wet your tag the 'wrinkles' are likely to be a lot smaller.

Dab your chosen Distress Stains on your mat (about the same amount as in the previous technique) and drag the tag through the stains.  If you need more than one drag, make sure you dry thoroughly between drags.  I needed two drags on this tag.  It was still not totally covered so I spritzed a little water over the tag and let it blend.

Once I was happy with the coverage, I dried the tag thoroughly.  Next, I ironed the tag between two pieces of thin fabric.  You could also use brown paper or plain copier paper.  If you are using your household iron, do not iron directly onto the tag, as some of the stain may transfer onto the iron and then onto your clothes (ask me how I know that...)!  I use a little travel iron that I keep for craft work only.  This flattens the tag beautifully but leaves lovely wrinkle imprints.

The surface is now flat enough to stamp on.  The tag shrinks slightly with this technique and so I usually add another tag underneath, in this case a Ranger black tag and it gives a lovely little border around the whole tag.  You can see how well the stamping works, even though the wrinkles look quite deep.

I finished this tag simply by adding some vintage seam binding which I also coloured with Distress Stain.  They really are amazingly versatile!

So there you have it, three ways to use Distress Stain for creating backgrounds.  If you have not tried these techniques before I hope you will feel inspired to do so.

The current challenge (HERE), at A Vintage Journey is being hosted by the uber talented Jenny and as some of you will know, it is all about stains. My Creative Guide Teamies have created some fabulous pieces using Distress Stains.  We hope that you will get your stains out and create something, inspired by Tim Holtz and join in the journey!

For more techniques for using Distress Stain you can see Tim in a video HERE.

Products used in this post can be found at Country View Crafts as follows:

Distress Stains - Find them HERE

Tim Holtz Stampers Anonymous Stamps - Find them HERE

Tim Holtz Collection of Layering Stencils - Find them HERE

Tim Holtz Idea-ology - Find it HERE

Tim Holtz Crinkle Ribbon - Find it HERE