Mouse Boy: Interiors as Inspiration

The year before I made my first scrapbook layout I filled an album with pages torn from interiors magazines. That was my paper fix then, though of course it was also all about the colour combinations and the looks I liked, and which I could replicate myself in the houses we renovate. I don't use it so much now because I'm more sure of what I want, and of the formula we have developed over the years. But I did fetch my album down from the shelf

and have a little nostalgic flip through as soon as Get It Scrapped asked for a page inspired by the use of textures in interior design. I had lots of tearsheets about texture in there: if you renovate a house to sell of course it pays to keep the decor neutral so that it appeals to as many potential buyers as you can find; and so the way to avoid bland and suggest comfort, cosiness and luxury is with texture. 

At first I thought my page was going to be white, then, with wood and kraft cardstock, you know? But when I paged through my album I chanced upon a collection of folk art images: all bright and woven together with stitching and ribbons, beautiful cushions and curtains which gave me an idea for a totally eclectic look. There was, without a doubt, only one subject who could help me pull it off and here he is. It's Little E, all dressed for World Book Day, ready to go to school as the boy who turns into a mouse in Roald Dahl's The Witches

Honestly, I think I could make every page I ever scrapbook in this way, with a band of embellishments stretching either across the page or up and down. It creates a shelf to put everything else on AND it's just plain fun to start at one end and work along until I get to the other, simply adding anything with the right look, one embellishment at a time. You can see I added not just the witches, but also a mouse tail or two made with  lengths of grey ribbon, knotted at the ends. I squeezed in as many textures as I could: cork, smooth wood, shiny puffy stickers, 

a tassel, some tied threads. But just look at those ears: don't they make you want to turn mouse for the day too?

You can see how the other Get It Scrapped Creative Team Members introduced texture to their pages right here Mix Textures On Your Scrapbook Page Using Inspiration From Home Interiors