Saturday 19 September 2015

It's a Washi-out - DIY photo frame tutorial

Massive apologies for the neglect and woefully late updates. Moving house (well, flat) has been a challenge with some pitfalls and, shall we say, technical issues (when you own a place, everything about it is all yours - and your problem). I'm also not due internet access for another week so that too has had to be outsourced.

Logistical barriers aside, it thankfully hasn't stopped me from creating and customising (in preparation for when I finally have to devote less spare time to making the place functional, leaving more for making it beautiful). Expect many a project and update on my recent home décor efforts over the next few weeks. My latest project involves a pane of glass I salvaged from a second-hand picture frame (which, incidentally, I bought for £8 from a market to use for another project).

You will need...


A pane of glass or clear plastic

Sticky back plastic (N.B. It has to have a grid printed on the backing)

2-3 differently patterned rolls of Washi tape

Scissors

Tape measure (optional)

Masking tape


Difficulty



Very easy


A classic case of cut, stick 'n' colour, without the skill of colouring in required!


Time


1-2 hours, depending on how many squares you want to cut (as I'll detail later).


Get the picture(s)


Decide how many photos you want your frame to hold. I chose 12 because I had quite a big pane of glass.

Use the grid on the backing of your sticky back plastic to decide what size you would like your  photo sleeves to be before cutting them out. I made mine 12x12cm (i.e. 6x6 squares according to the grid).

Using the grid on your sticky back plastic, peel and fold back a certain amount of backing along the bottom and on the two sides.



Cut away the excess backing.


Once you have cut out all the photo sleeves, you need to plan out where you are going to put them. Try to leave an equal amount of space between the photographs and the edges. I tackled this by  placing masking tape along the bottom.

I then placed another row of masking tape directly above it and removed the tape along the bottom.

I stuck my first sleeve on the opposite side to the tape so that I could align the bottom of the tape with the bottom of the sleeve.



I also used the same masking tape process to leave an equal amount of space between the rows.



Going back to more direct instructions, you might want to measure the glass pane to calculate where to put the sleeves so that they are the same distance apart from each other.

Once you've finished sticking your sleeves down, the final step is to remove all masking tape and, on the opposite side of the pane to the sleeves, stick some Washi tape frames around the 'white' areas of your sleeves.