What is Paper Filigree ?
(according to wickopedia) "Quilling or paper filigree is an art form that involves the use of strips of paper that are rolled, shaped, and glued together to create decorative designs. The paper is wound around a quill to create a basic coil shape. The paper is then glued at the tip and the coil shaped, these shaped coils are arranged to form flowers, leaves, and various ornamental patterns similar to ironwork.
During the Renaissance, French and Italian nuns and monks used quilling to decorate book covers and religious items. The paper most commonly used was
Another way of getting around this is to paint rather than print your paper and paint is a lot cheaper than ink and and srapbooking paper or quilling paper for that matter. Also painting your own paper has another couple of advantages first you can mix exactly the color you want , if you are painting on paper either new regular printing paper or used scrap printing paper (yes you can use previously printed on paper you are painting on it so almost nothing will show through) when painted on both sides the paint is absorbed through both sides and depending on the absorbancy of your printing paper it should meet in the middle more often than not, that white line is not visable when the paper is cut or folded , if it does show up on certain spots of the finished product you have the exact color match to dot on with a very fine paint brush ,the touch up will never show. I used hand painted paper for the blue roses exibited at foot of blog card post. A further benefit is that freshly painted but completely dry to the touch handcut quilling strips have that extra bit of give in them so are less likely to rip or tear and in my opinion it
just has this nice maluable feel to it that other papers don't. Of course if same paper is allowed to dry out 100% say nextday use, the paper feels just the same as any other.
Ok so we now have colored quilling paper I recomend that you cut your strips 1 cm wide along the longest edge of your paper so you have several strips of each color.
Quilled Heart
1)The very first step is to take a quilling strip and fold it in half in the middle so both sides are of equal length.
Copyright Pages from the Heart
Freely distributable so long as this link remains in place
Paper Filigree Valentines Day Card Tutorial
Equipment List
Strips of colored paper
Small Scissors/ exact-o Knife
Ruler
White Glue
Quilling Tool or substitute
(Kebab skewer, thin screw driver,
the handle end of small paint brush)
Blank card
It is possible to buy thin strips of colored paper in various widths known as quilling paper ,however with a ruler or other straight edged tool and a craft knife it is very easy to make your own. The only benefit for purchasing quilling strips apart from not having to cut them yourself is that on quilling paper the dye or ink used to create the paper goes all the way through ,so when it is bent or folded or cut a white inner center is not revealed along the strips cut edge as it often is on either quilling strips you have printed and cut yourself ,or on most scapbooking sheets that can be cut and used for quilling or when utilizing scrap colored papers from envelopes or flyers. But one way of over coming this white edge is to color it with a pencil crayon in a similar color to the body of the strip by simply running the point of the colored pencil along the cut edge.
1) Take a quilling strip and fold it in half so you have two sides of equal length
2)Then take your quilling tool or make shift quilling tool and wrap around it the tip of one of one side of your folded quilling strip , if you dampen the very edge of the strip (you can lick it with the tip of your tongue if you like) you will find it will stick to your tool and is easier to start off your roll.
3) Roll the quilling strip towards you trying as best as you can to keep the paper centered on top of its self so your roll does not start to form more of a cone.
4) keep rolling until you have coiled up almost all of the length of your quilling strip until it gets to roughly with in a centimeter of your fold.
5) Next genly slide the rolled end off the tip of your quilling tool , it may unravel a little but don't worry about this. Another benefit of using freshly painted quilling strips is it will not unravel anywhere near as much and will remain obediently in place until you touch it.
6)Now take the other end of the strip and do exactly the same thing with it making sure once again you are rolling the strip towards you....so that the open mouth of your v fold is facing towards you.
7) Slip coil from end of quilling tool you should have something resembling this
8) if you allow or encourage you coils to unravel and pull gently on the point of your heart you can vary the size of the heart as we have used the entire length of a strip of A4 printing paper the largest you can make your heart extend is probably about 4 to 4.5 inches of course the more you unravel it the less ornate and intricate it will appear. But practice on a scrap piece of
printing paper making hearts of different sizes , you can also alter the size and shape of the heart by altering the width and length of the quilling strip make a few samples until you feel comfortable about the process it won't take long.
9) You don't need to make completely symmetrical hearts if you don't wish to, your hearts can be lob sided , one side can be allowed to coil more than the other , experiment until you form a heart shape you are happy with.
Once you are happy with the proportions of your heart , put a tiny dab of white glue in the cleft of your heart where the coils meet ,use either the tiny end of your skewer or a cocktail stick or even a straight pin will do, and hold it firmly together with your finger tips until the glue becomes tacky and the paper sticks together only a few seconds . But if you prefer you can hold the heart together by means of a hair pin. this is what I have done on largest heart in picture I think you can just about make it out. This method works well particularly for smaller pieces and those in which you wish to encourage a more symmetrical look. OK so now you know all there is to know about quilled hearts now onto our second design element.
Believe it or not the technique is exactly the same as for the the quilled heart. But with two subtle differences.
A) Do NOT fold your quilling strip in half ,do though keep an eye on where the center of the quilling strip is you may if it gives you more confidence mark the center of the strip with a very tiny dot.
B) When you have reached the center point of your quilling strip with your downward roll and gently removed it from your quilling tool , instead of turning the remaining piece to face towards you turn it away or turn it over so this roll is being formed on the opposite side of the quilling strip forming an S shape.
You now know how to make quilled scrolls experiment with a few, loosen the coils make some symetrical others with one rolled end much bigger than the other and vary the length and width of your quilling strip just as you did for the heart. Until you feel comfortable with the technique. Now all that remains is to decide on a design layout for your card. , you can copy mine or come up with your own.
One last tip when gluing you quilling pieces to the card use the least amount of glue possible apply it to each individual piece not to the card apply with cocktail stick or straight pin. The white glue dries clear and is fairly slow drying so allows a little maneuverability
I will include in the download the card template though it seems hardly worth it ,as the design is so basic ,just a simple window card I will include both the very plain and the more decoratve one seen in the first image. and my awful little poem for the inside.
Unfortunately I can not tell you how to place the front card image or the inside image so they will actually print on a folded A4 in their respective positions .....all printers frint on pages from differnt feeds so it will not be the same for your printer as it is for mine. But this you will already of learned through past experience or are about to learn right now through trial and error. One pointer I can suggest is most printshop programs or any with which you can create cards most will will find out by a little printing test how your printer feeds the paper ,it will then produce a little image of how you need to position a graphic in order to align another in a particular arrangement with it. So before you waste several pieces of paper (but you can always use them to quill with now) discovering your printers feed process by guess work read the programs help file it might just tell you how to set it up with your model of printer.
strips of paper trimmed from the gilded edges of books. These gilded paper strips were then rolled to create the quilled shapes. Quilling often imitated the original ironwork of the day.
In the 18th century, quilling became popular in Europe where gentle ladies of quality ("ladies of leisure") practiced the art. It was one of the few things ladies could do that was thought not too taxing for their minds or gentle dispositions. Quilling also spread to the Americas and there are still exist a few examples from Colonial times."
