Grotesque wooden box, Smeared ink Throw down

So how is everybody? I'd like to say thank you as always for stopping by and spending your time here, I love having you all visit.
 Today I am posting my Grotesque box, this has been made for a new challenge hosted on the Smeared Ink forum, the crazy girls over at SI have just launched a Design Team Throw Down, for all the details head over and have a look, basically this is open to any DT's out there, all you need is to submit a banner for your DT and then have a maximum of three of you create a piece that fits the challenge theme, there is then a round of voting by the forum members and the team with the most individual votes gets the bragging rights and a cool banner for your blog.

It really is a great community, they mainly cater for left of centre creations and have a great Digi store, but everyone is made to feel welcome, there is loads going on, they have monthly swaps, tutorials and challenges. Head on over and take a peak and see who is creating what for the very first Throw Down.
 The first theme is paint and Splatter.
 Ok, so there will be a few pics in this post (sorry).
 My grotesque box gets its name for what I have placed inside, more about him in a mo, first the box.
 It started life as a plain wooden cigar box and has had pretty much everything thrown at it, all of which has been picked up on the Andy Skinner workshop club at my local store.

 I have used a mix of modeling paste and texture crackle from Deco Art to create the textures and some Dream Weaver paste through one of Andy Skinners new stencils, the skull. I have added some Wendy Vecci resin embellishments and some beads for a little bit of interest.Above is the top and to the right is the front of the box.Everything was given a base coat of white acrylic paint and then colour was built up with various Acrylic paints from Deco Art blended together randomly. A top coat of a semi translucent high pigment yellow was applied and when dry I added a wash of black and then some dry brushing to bring out the different textures.

Here are the sides and back of the box.I then flicked bark brown and white paint all over so I could get my splatter effect, I also went in with an embossing pen and randomly added some frantage embossing enamel in vintage white

Here is a close up od the top showing some of the texture in the modeling paste and some of the frantage powder and white paint.To finish off I coated the whole box with a satin varnish.


Now this little chap, the Grotesque, was painted in this months class. he started out as a plain Bisque wall hanging and was given the same sort of paint treatment as the box and fits inside nicely. I also learnt that the difference between a grotesque and a gargoyle is that a gargoyle has a spout for water to pour from the mouth.
Here he is hanging on my fence in the garden.




Well thank you again for stopping by and sticking with the waffle, believe it or not I do try and keep it shortish ;)
If you find yourself with some free time why not stop on by the Smeared Ink forum and join the party, have a look around and thenn stop on by and vote for your fave creation. there is a new challenge every two weeks.
 And remember we have just started our new challenge over at Haunted Design House  we want to see all your undead inspired creations, it can be anything  at all, think, vampires, zombies, walking dead etc.

Well I hope you all have a productive and crafty week. x

PS,  I forgot I needed to use a stamped image, either digi or rubber so I did the inside lid of the box, the skulls are from Paper Artsy. The script stamp Is from the Artistic Stamper and the BG stamp behind the skulls has been designed by my friend Neil Walker it's a fantastic cross hatch texture design, he has just released his first load of stamps, also by the Artistic Stamper. worth checking out both his blog and the new range of his products.


I would like to enter this into the challenge over at Smudgy Antics, they are having a crumble it theme. My box is crumbling away and all sorts of distressed ;)