DIY BUSINESS TAGS AND CARDS - Part I

 

Cost: ~0- $10

Materials:
– paper towel rolls

– watercolor &/or acrylic paint(s)

– mod-podge, matte or glossy
– rub on stencil stickers or stamps
– any additional metallic/colors- optional

– labels- optional

 

Tools:
– paint brushes
– printer - optional
– ruler
– scissors
– cutting mat

 

~Free Within Abundance~

 

In today’s post we focus on creating your very own handmade business tags and cards!

 

DIY projects are a great way to add a unique aspect or style to your business brand’s presentation. Especially if your products are handmade goods.

 

Reasons why to create your own business tags & cards:

 

-You're just starting out

-Sticking to a budget is of importance at this time.

-You make handmade goods and would like to carry that theme throughout your brand’s display.

-Would simply like to add a distinct artistic element

-Or maybe incorporating materials that are up-cycled or repurposed are of interest for your brand’s message.

 

 

  

Note:

Be open to the flow and improvising. Variations/options are available. Feel free to run with your creative vision.

Supplies:

Most supplies are already around in your home or office/studio or found at your local dollar store. Play around and have fun.

Printing options:

If using textured materials, like paper towel rolls, do not use your home printer. Unless you know you have a printer that can handle textured material. From your home computer you can create labels.

 

Printing Alternatives:

-A self inking stamp on blank labels is an option or using a stencil method.

 

Prep...

Paper Sheets

Re-purposing ...

Smooth paper towel rolls work best, as glued ones don't absorb water (some paper towel have a remaining glue on the roll), mod-podge, or paint as well.

To begin, cut your paper towel roll down the center, flatten between some books-this may take up to a week. Once you flatten your paper towel roll it becomes a sheet.

  

 

First Application...

Once flattened, start with a quarter size of white acrylic paint, teaspoon of mod-podge, with three tablespoons of water.

This is what I have found to start with, from there variate. You may want to play with your  own recipe for your consistency.

 

The water will absorb into the sheet bringing along with it the mod-podge medium and some of the white paint. Paint both front and back. Dry thoroughly.

 

This process can be repeated 1-4+ times depending on the look you are going for. As the applications will start to strengthen the texture.

Depending on your desired color density, add more color to your mixture. 

Below, are examples of less white acrylic paint used in the foundational application. Allowing the sheet's original natural material color to come through. The color paint application mixtures keep this thematic look going.

 

 

(In this batch an emphasis was put on having the sheet's natural material color comes through the paint applications.)

 

 

Adding Color...

Emphasizing your card or tag's background with color. In the display cards, below, more paint is added to the mixture. Giving more color and texture density.

  

 

 

What kinds of paint?

For this project we suggest using acrylic or watercolor paints. Feel free to mix the two as well. Mod-podge is crucial for using either watercolor or acrylics. 

Mod-podge is a medium used between and for others materials. A carrier of paint color, transparency, and layering as well as a sealant or glue. (It's a multitasker!). 

When painting with color, it is recommended to add 1-4 applications. Even if the color is made to be translucent (more water than color). Be sure to dry between each application. And note, the mod-podge in the mixture is key to help strengthen and texturize the body to your new tags or cards. 

 

Measure & Cut...

 

Your colored sheets are now ready to be measured & cut. Decide on what measurements suite your display needs. Use a ruler and/or cutting mat to mark you measurements. Then cut. 

 

 

 

Place your labels on the now cut tags or cards. You might like to use a stamp, press on/ stencils, stickers or metallic/colors to add a bit of contrast, that is your call. Additionally, you may need to trim. 

 

 

 

Check out using some wavy craft scissors for you tags, as shown, as
an option.

 

 

 

Creating tags, place a hole using a hole punch or sharp instrument,1/4" from the edge is recommended for strength. In the image, cotton and twine are used.  Again it's your call.

Sweet!

You are now ready to tag your products while up-cycling & re-purposing!

 

In this foundational tutorial, your job is to expand, play, and create.

 

Have fun! 

 

Head over to Part II here!

Art as Activism: Protecting Land Water & Life - Behind the Scenes with Beech Designs & Sol Vybz

Beech Designs is delighted to partner up with some amazing creative and visionary folks.

And Sol Vybz is one of them.
 
Here, we’ll share what Sol Vybz is, behind the scenes, and what it means to support our partnership.

 

Simple Beginnings

 
Sol Vybz's was humbly started by a couple of island sisters (twins), dedicated to keeping the art of handmade goods alive while building a conscious community. With origins in Cape Verde and a base in Florida Sol & Joy find it “important to reflect, digest, and share” their experiences. 

 

Sol & Joy

 

Vision & Mission

Online, they seek to provide functional and diverse styles while giving a unique look and feel through handmade jewelry and art. Their foundational stages for growth lies with Nature as a key component. And materials are chosen with intentional efforts for durability, ECO friendly & comfort.

 

Ra Eye in Rainbow Light

Crocheted Layer Wrap Beaded Necklace

Whether it’s to enhance with gemstones, yoga practice, meditation, earthing, or aromatherapy, with which to support focus, clarity, and emotional balance, Sol Vybz’s hand crafted pieces are designed to bring joy throughout the many aspects of life’s journey.

 

Their mission is two fold, to bring and share handmade creations which in turn helps fund preserving and protecting the land and origins of their homeland Cape Verde. A project in process with your help, what happens here on the island is a template that can be used worldwide, people, land, and nature.

Tinted Cantharus Shell Pendant

In The Flow : Bayong Wood - Bracelet

Feeding A Larger Vision

Here’s a deeper look of the workings behind the scenes….
 
What is Sol Vybz up to?
 
“Sol Vybz is excited to share we have started to work with some NGO's (non-governmental organization) here in the Cape Verde islands. Assisting with conservation work of the native lands, feeding the biodiversity here, and educating the locals, including the youth, with projects of living sustainability.”
 
 
Please share more about what you are doing with the land.
 
“Currently one of the projects we are looking forward to supporting is Fog catchers to harness water. There’s a lot of water shortages in Brava Island, where flowing water is only accessible a few days a week for majority of the island.
 
There is a lot of fog all around the island, which makes it a perfect place to practice water cultivation. Their NGO there is called Biflores & we would like to help them continue funding this project further.”

 

The Fog in Cape Verde

Fog & Joy in Cape Verde

 

Can you please share more about your plans to enrich the lives of the people?
 
“Yes, well being of the people here & their farm lands is important to us. We would like to strengthen the bridge and bring the beautiful roots of the heritage and culture back stronger by original practices that honor the land and in turn feed, fuel, and fulfill the people here.
 

Brava Island

Brava Island

 

These first step initiatives Sol Vybz is taking to sustain & revitalize our land is with a focus of honoring the land’s soul vibrations first through connecting with the biodiversity as well with the locals.”

 

Flora in Brava

Brava Island

              

 

Anything else you’d like to share?
 
 
“Yes, your support helps all of us continue our work, maintaining awareness … coexisting more mindfully & harmoniously with the biodiversity all around us.
 
To broaden potential, bring awareness and honor, to enrich the land and the lives within the environment and atmosphere, while maintaining a solid foundation within the modern world.
That is our vibration.”

“Remember to have fun & keep the good vybz flowing, infinite ways, in many waves.” Sol Vybz

 

 You can discover more at: www.solvybz.com
 
 

Beech Designs is grateful to be a part of activism to protecting land, water, and life peacefully through Art and creativity.

 

Bringing Creative Experiences to Families & Children

 

 

       Creative Endeavors

You may be familiar with Beech Designs jewelry, but there is art too.

Curated selected works are now featured at the Boston Children's Hospital's new Hale Family Building. 

It's exciting to be part of this comprehensive art program, that brings an immersive creative experience of more than 700 individual pieces of art. 

This collection, on view, presents different life themes. With each floor displaying a separate theme- Garden, Underwater, Harbor, City, Forest, Lake, Mountain, Space & Treetop.

 

Word & Image

It is an honor to be selected to take part in this visionary/project for the whole family to enjoy. Where creative imagination and good vibes take place. 

Several mixed media 2D art, of fish/nautical inspired works, were selected. These pieces were created using watercolor and ink work. 

The pieces, combine the elegant art with short poems in the display plaques. Bringing visual illustrations and the creative word together. Like Goldie the Fish.

 

Goldie by Beech Designs

 

Goldie

Made of gold and silver,
She passes through time and space.

Alert in fluid tranquility,
She brings clarity with ease and grace.

Call upon her in your dreams,
And with the waving of her fins,
Flecked with light beams,
A path of protection she brings.

 

 

These 2D works will become available on Beech Designs' website. So stay tuned for more to come. This collaboration has inspired future works and will be shared here with updates.

 

Here's to another great year! Full of abundance, prosperity & creativity.

Cheers! 

G

Discover more of Beech Designs' jewelry side in A Bit About The Bead

20 Astonishing Holiday Complaints

A recent survey from Thomas Cook and ABTA reveals 20 of the most ridiculous complaints by holiday-makers made to their travel agent.

(Image source unknown)

 

 

 

 

1. "I think it should be explained in the brochure that the local store does not sell proper biscuits like custard creams or ginger nuts."

 

2. "It's lazy of the local shopkeepers to close in the afternoons. I often needed to buy things during 'siesta' time - this should be banned."

 

3. "On my holiday to Goa in India, I was disgusted to find that almost every restaurant served curry. I don't like spicy food at all."

  

4. "We booked an excursion to a water park but no-one told us we had to bring our swimming costumes and towels."

 

5. A tourist at a top African Game Lodge over looking a water hole, who spotted a visibly aroused elephant, complained that the sight of this rampant beast ruined his honeymoon by making him feel "inadequate".

 

6. A woman threatened to call police after claiming that she'd been locked in by staff. When in fact, she had mistaken the "do not disturb" sign on the back of the door as a warning to remain in the room.

 

7. "The beach was too sandy."

 

8. "We found the sand was not like the sand in the brochure.Your brochure shows the sand as yellow but it was white."

 

9. A guest at a Novotel in Australia complained his soup was too thick and strong. He was inadvertently slurping the gravy at the time.

 

10. "Topless sunbathing on the beach should be banned. The holiday was ruined as my husband spent all day looking at other women."

 

11. "We bought 'Ray-Ban' sunglasses for five Euros from a street trader, only to find out they were fake."

 

12. "No-one told us there would be fish in the sea. The children were startled."

 

13. "It took us nine hours to fly home from Jamaica to England it only took the Americans three hours to get home."

  

14. "I compared the size of our one-bedroom apartment to our friends' three-bedroom apartment and ours was significantly smaller.."

  

15. "The brochure stated: 'No hairdressers at the accommodation’. We’re trainee hairdressers - will we be OK staying there?"

 

16. "There are too many Spanish people. The receptionist speaks Spanish. The food is Spanish. Too many foreigners now live abroad."

 

17. "We had to queue outside with no air conditioning."

 

18. "It is your duty as a tour operator to advise us of noisy or unruly guests before we travel."

 

19. "I was bitten by a mosquito, no-one said they could bite."

 

20. "My fiancé and I booked a twin-bedded room but we were placed in a double-bedded room. We now hold you responsible for the fact that I find myself pregnant. This would not have happened if you had put us in the room that we booked."

 

 

Source Here

A Bit About The Bead: Seed Beads & The History Of Glass Beads

Seed Bead Origins

To begin this journey of sharing about some of the beads used at Beech Designs- we focus on glass Czech seed beads.

Beech, G. "A Bit About The Bead". 9.2023

What are seed beads?

The term seed bead are beads that are produced in a factory. Made by drawing glass, where by glass is literally drawn or pulled, with a hollow mass, into a long tube. Then goes through several more steps involving the fusion between fire, sand, soda and lime to produce glass seed beads.

 

One type of bead is Czech glass beads predating the Czech Republic.

 

A bit of history...

For our blog- speculation says the production of glass beads began in ancient Egypt and many cultures successfully adopted the practice over the centuries. Some believe glass was invented in the Middle East by ancient Jews and Hebrews, in ancient places like Babylon, Phoenicia, and gained a reputation as the best glass-makers in the world. 

Glass centers were formed in principle cities for ease of trade and Venice, Italy became one such city. By the 8^th century glass manufacturing had emerged in Germany, along the Rhine River. And by the 14^th century King Charles invited German glass-makers to relocate to his kingdom of Bohemia to establish a glass industry.

 

The land offered an abundance of resources needed for glass production; rich in unlimited sources of water, quartz, sand, and trees. In these mountains small towns grew and by the 1400’s North Bohemia was the glass manufacturing center.

 

~Origins~

The history of Czech glass beads is thought to go as far back as the 3^rd century BCE when the Celts began to produce the first glass in Bohemia, known today as the Czech Republic. 

It was the Bohemian people that were the great force & source that contributed to the success of glass beads, impacting glass bead production to this day! Perfecting glass bead-making techniques that make Czech beads famous for their beauty, variety, and consistently high quality. The cottage artisans of Bohemia were the foundation of the quality standard Czech glass beads are still known for today.

 

By the middle of the 16^th century glass workshops sprung up across the Jizera mountains, eventually dubbed “the Crystal Valley”. And from there, Czech glass makers expanded their trade, exporting glass beads globally.

It wasn’t until the 1830’s that machines began producing glass beads. The process of manufacturing the glass molds was both difficult and had to be precise.  

Cottage artisans were called upon and given several molds for each bead press and turned out beads to order for their local factory, becoming masters of pressed glass they continue to remain innovative, perfecting and improving every form of bead-making.

 

Why we use Czech Glass Seed Beads

~Diversity: color, shape, size

~Quality: uniform hole

~Heritage: Czech tradition centuries of bead making

~Design possibilities: they are perfect for both modern designs and recreating vintage styles

*No two Czech beads are the same. And designing with materials that are similar, but not identical gives each piece created a unique one of a kind look/essence/vibe.

 

Finishes

Here’s a look a few bead color effect finishes.

 

Beech, G. "A Bit About The Bead". 9.2023

 

Different bead finishes can play into many pattern design possibilities.

 

Czech seed beads have beautiful unparalleled symmetry and are featured throughout different stitch techniques here at Beech Designs.