Perhaps you love books, and flowers, and hate the inevitably of a flower dying like I do. So why not give new life to a recycled book and make some upcycled book page watercolor roses?
As a librarian, I’ve got access to a lot of damaged books that need to be pulled from the shelves. I absolutely adore turning these damaged books into fun book page art! You can always use an out of date encyclopedia, magazine pages, sheet music, or a stained/spine damaged book for your watercolor roses.
First, gather your materials. You will need:
- Book pages or magazine pages or musical sheets
- Small paintbrushes
- Watercolor paints (watercolor palette or liquid watercolor)
- Hot glue gun/glue
- Stems
- Scissors
- Pencil
- Scrap paper or newspaper for painting and drying
Next, follow the beginning steps of this tutorial by 100 Layer Cake. I have taken this tutorial and expanded on it to make the roses colors, but the actual tutorial for the roses is NOT mine, so please follow their tutorial on how to make the actual rose shape. 🙂 Make sure you follow steps 1-2 and then STOP before you hit step 3. You will come back to that after you follow my next steps.
After you cut out the paper roses (I recommend cutting 5 pages thick at a time) paint them with your watercolors. First place them on scrap paper or newspaper.
For a more muted color I used liquid watercolors. If you want darker colors, I used a watercolor vivid palette and directly painted from the watercolor palette to the book page with minimal water.
Take your paint brush and thoroughly one side of each petal.
Let dry and then flip over to paint the other side. This is about how the unpainted side should look.
Paint the other side of your rose petal, let dry.
Next, go back to 100 Layer Cake’s tutorial for the rest of your rose.
Enjoy your completed rose!
Here’s what they look like with the “muted” liquid watercolors:
Here is what they look like with the “vivid” watercolor technique:
Make tons and give them out to friends and family or keep all to yourself!
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