A Unique Camp Experience

Let me get to the point with this post, my Camp experience was life-changing. Business growth, spiritual growth, fun. Can’t say enough good about it!

So, I was asked to do a stencil workshop and discuss my brand at the Unique Camp, a project created by Unique LA founder Sonja Rasula. Camp is basically a 4-day getaway in this case to Big Bear Mountain, 2 hours outside of LA. The conference helps entrepreneurs focus on their business goals with classes and workshops ranging from how to raise venture capital to well, how to stencil! Yes, the balance of business, art, physical challenges, dancing, and drinks at night all worked well together!

Sonja’s welcome chat included a reading from Disney CEO Michael Eisner’s book CAMP and sort of set the tone for the entire experience. I took the reading to mean ‘Yea. you will be slightly uncomfortable and challenged and out of your element here but this is where growth occurs and some great bonding as well.’  It, for me, was rather spiritual to grow myself as well as my business. As a rather quiet gent, I set my intention to come out of my shell, listen to people and have fun – I think I met all 110 people! Oh, and BTW, we were UNPLUGGED. ESSENTIAL!

AS for the stencil workshop, I chose a place under 5 large pines. We had a variety of supplies and I showed how to stencil paper, t-shirts, bags, and more. One lucky winner received a bunch of Plaid supplies, she was the star student for stenciling her Everlane bag with my arrow stencil. Amazing job.  I spoke about starting Stencil1 from a dream to a full-time business while we got creative. So many people were there to start their own business, I hope I inspired their ideas.  I too was inspired by many of the workshops including Sonja’s which was about getting press and Whitney Chamberlain who owns a few businesses including Smile Booth and how his biz goals basically came out of his own needs in life.  I also kept observing the fine details that the Camp crew put into their branding, from table cloths to archery targets. Branding details matter.

I have a bunch of photos from the time away, I hope you enjoy them. Camp also put these up here. I can’t recommend enough to go to CAMP!

Layering Image with Pattern

One of my favorite techniques is layering. I love to layer iconic imagery over a pattern. In this case, I am making art that is a two layer stencil of a deer over a pattern. Sort of a city-meets-country feel to it!

I started by painting my board a neutral color.

I then mixed a little grey paint with the base color to slightly darken it for my pattern layer. I stenciled my quatrefoil pattern on top of the solid painted board. This stencil is designed to repeat like wallpaper so I moved it around to fill the board with the pattern.

Once dry, it was time for the silhouette layer of the Antlered Deer. I love this guy, he’s so confident. Anyway, I wanted to use some pop colors – bright yellow as the base. It took three coats to cover the pattern.

Once dry, I stenciled the deer detail layer in a deep blue. For detailed stencils, always go light with your paint, stenciling is a dry brush technique. I can’t say that enough.

And there you have your modern piece of art.

Wet Paint on Wedges

When I recently attended the ALT Summit held at Martha Stewart’s HQ, I noticed that many of the blogger gals there had on high wedges. Some were even decorated or painted. Well, I can do that too! I had to try it out. I got these cork wedge heels at Amarcord, a vintage store in Williamsburg Brooklyn for a few bucks. I thought my asian inspired rainbow repeat pattern would be perfect in a burnt orange for summer. I just held the stencil in place, filled in the design with a VERY DRY BRUSH, and there you have it. These say fun, do you agree?

Addicted to CRACKle Medium

The Folk Art crackle medium for me, is like finding the holy grail. I just love an aged finish. I find such inspiration in urban landscape and decay and with this stuff, I can re-create that worn, weathered look.
Here’s how I did it – First, I painted a wood board dark brown and let it dry. Then I coated the brown painted board with the crackle medium and let that dry. Next,  I painted over the board again with a light cream color.

Immediately, I saw the paint bubbling and spreading apart.

I LOVE the results and decided my typewriter stencil would be appropriate for this worn looking surface. I stenciled the typewriter design in a very dark blue, nearly black paint.

I then found a nice home for it on my shelves with my books!

Grasscloth – a natural choice

I love to paint on surfaces that already have wonderful texture and a beautiful finish. Grasscloth is one of those surfaces. It’s natural, beautiful, and affordable. I cut some small squares of the cloth and using a few folk art paint colors I love, I stenciled these birds and bees stencil designs. These could be framed and made into wall art or varnished and used as coasters.

Wingtips v2

I am seeing so many colorful wingtip shoes for guys. Two-toned, colorful soles, color is not just for the ladies anymore! So I grabbed an old suede pair of wingtips I had, mixed some folk art blue paint with medium textile, and voila! I just painted in the separated sections! easy. Can’t wait to wear them!