Feature Friday: Monika Wagner

Guten Tag und Glücklicher Freitag (that last bit means Happy Friday!)

We just had to share a fabulous set of stenciled things from one of our lovely German crafters, Monika Wagner.  She's got a Dawanda shop, which is basically like German Etsy, as far as I can tell.

Look at the treasures:

Pinboard using our Musee D'Orsay Address Stencil

Our Simple Family and Friends Stencil on a Leather Satchel

Key Collector with our Chateau Villandry Stencil

How great are these?  I love the satchel and I never would have thought to stencil on that!  She also has a bunch of amazing found objects, you should absolutely pop on over and check them out.

Thanks to Monika for letting us feature her wares!

Keep your eyes peeled for a promo code coming up this weekend.  We'll advertise it on our Facebook and Twitter as well.

Take care!

Feature Friday: The Typewriter Case

Happy Friday!

FYI:  30% off all stencils now through Wed, Feb 20 with promo code president2013.

This is such a unique feature, just had to share with you guys.

Betsy at My Salvaged Treasures took our "Family and Friends Gather Here" 12x12 Stencil and applied it to a vintage typewriter case. 

How gorgeous is that?  She also did a companion case with stencils from another source.  I love the little keys she added for extra decoration.

Here's the layout before she got started.  Good opportunity to show what our packaging looks like if you're not familiar.  All our normal sized (12x12, 5.5x11.5, 8x8, 12x18) stencils come packed in clear cellophane sleeves with backing.  If you get a large stencil like our 24x24 or 6x24 stencils, those will come wrapped in tissue and arrive in a tube.

 Great picture illustrating the amount of paint she used.  I've said it before, I'll say it again.   A little paint goes a long way and you can always add more! 

The peel-away.  No bleeding underneath the stencil and this is a rough surface.  I've been talking with one client recently who was concerned that the stucco texture on her walls might cause some bleed with stencils, which is definitely a legitimate thing to be worried about.  We sent out samples for her to test in an unconspicious area, but seeing that this bumpy typewriter case took paint beautifully leads me to believe she'll be in the pink.  Or white.  Or whatever color she chooses to paint!  :)

Family and Friends Gather Here is an incredibly popular stencil, we offer it in 2 varieties in 12x12, and one in 12x18.  We also have a Family and Friends simple that we ran a free promotion with a few months back.  We will be adding that for sale shortly.

If you'd like to check out the Family and Friends Family (not redundant at all!)  have a peek at our French category.

Thanks to Betsy at My Salvaged Treasures for showcasing her beautiful work featuring our product on her blog.  We're also going to be running a giveaway with her soon, so keep your eyes peeled.

Have a great weekend!

Feature Friday: New Custom Name and Date Stencil

Happy Friday!

Sometimes the idea for a stencil comes from purely selfish reasons.  We're not entirely altruistic here at Maison.  lol!  A while back while working on the pallet project, I realized I was going to have some leftover wood and wanted to make something for myself.  So I created a monster 24x24 pallet sign I wanted to fill a blank wall in my kitchen.  I didn't really know what to do with it though. 

I was browsing through our stencils for something to blow up that size when I started thinking about our custom name and date stencils.  They're really popular for crafters who want to make signs or pillows with the date they got married. 

There are some great options there, but I wanted something that had more of a vintage look, to go with the feel of my house.  So I designed a stencil that had a bit of a Victorian look and had it cut mega large for the 24x24 pallet.

I really love the way it came out, even if the sign is way crooked on the right side.  I thought about fixing it, but I like it imperfect.  We live in a crooked house, on a crooked street, just go with it, you know?  I'm pretty boring about reusing paint, you may have noticed.  So that red color is the same as our hearth pad for the wood burning stove, our staircase going to the second floor,  and several signs elsewhere in the house.  It's nice to have some continuity in color, I think.

Here's another photo of the kitchen.  We have a built-in breakfast nook my husband built.  That's what the sign is above.  It's one of my favorite spots in the house.  I sent a photo when it was all done to Laura and she really loved the design and insisted we make a pillow with it as well.  (I'm learning how to sew.)  So she dragged out her Viking and showed me how she makes her pillows and we used this stencil for my demo project.  The fabric is actually drop cloth from Home Depot.  Too cool!

So the pillow resides in the living room where it is most often loving sat upon by our orange cat, Moe. 

Nico, the tortiseshell, favors the other chair.  I love the way the pillow came out.  We used a 12x12 size for that and decided we want to offer it in the store.  So if you check out the custom category, you'll find this stencil there.  Like all of our custom stencils, just email us after purchase with the info you want plugged in and we'll design it for you.

That's all I've got for today, catch you next week!

Feature Friday: Tout Va Bien Pillow

Happy Friday!

It hailed here today.  I've got a roaring fire in the fireplace and Graham and I are watching Barefoot Contessa.  (Nice break from cartoons!)  In other words, it's all good here in Oregon.  Which reminds me of this feature I've got for you today.

How cute is this little pillow?  Courtesy of Forgetmenotdreams.

It's so sweet and simple and I love that the stenciling is done in brown.   Tout Va Bien actually means roughly, "All's going well." 

You can purchase this pillow from Forgetmenotdreams' Etsy store.  She's got great stuff, I LOVE her tags.  I just have to show you these cat hang tags.  They have nothing to do with us, they just crack me up.

I have two cats schooled in this philosophy!  :)

If you want to check out the Tout Va Bien, please browse our fabulous French category. 

Have a lovely weekend!  See you next week!

Feature Friday: The Lucas Moller Bench

Happy Friday!

It's such a dreary Oregon day here in Astoria today, hoping some of you have a slice of sun left.  I've got a lovely feature for you today courtesy of Rhoda at Blue Creek Home.

She rehabbed a cute little bench using some know-how and one of our stencils.

I love the distressed paint!  She used canvas for the upholstery and then tea stained it for a vintage look.

Then she applied our popular Lucas Moller stencil with grey paint to give it that grainsack look.  I love the way it came out!

Lucas Moller can be found in our feedsack section of the website, which you can access here. 

Here's the original post for this bench, it went to live at the Old Bank Antiques Mall with some equally beautiful pieces. 

Blue Creek Home has a great blog, which you can check out here. 

She also sells on Etsy and had some super cool made and found objects.  Check it out here. 

Feature Friday: The Thorsten Eckart Pillow

Good Morning Everyone!

We have been so busy with our 20% sale.  Just in case you aren't on our mailing list, right now all our stencils are 20% off now through Sunday.  Just use code: stockup20 when checking out on our website!

I wanted to show you guys this great pillow though, courtesy of FunkyShique.

FunkyShique makes these out of feedsack inspired fabric as they are bed pillows.  The fabric has a more soft feel, which I can appreciate.  I don't think I'd want to lay my weary head on a grainsack.

She sells these in her etsy shop as a single listing and a two pillow listing.

They look just perfect on that bed!


Thorsten Eckart is one of our German Feedsack stencils, I just love it.  You can check out it and it's other German brethren in our Feedsack category.  

Here's a link to the listing for this item in FunkyShique's Etsy shop.  You should totally check out her Etsy shop, it is filled with amazing stuff!

Feature Friday: The Bordeaux Headboard

Hi Readers!

Sorry for the late post, we've been so busy lately!  I wanted to show you another in-house project Laura did.  We have a wonderful client who requested a custom design of a Bordeaux Wine Label.  Well we designed it all and cut it and the first version turned out to be an "oops" stencil where we goofed up on an R.  Now we couldn't send it with a flaw like that, so we had to redo the stencil and mail that version. 

That left us with a 99.9% perfectly great 24x24 stencil, which seemed terrible to just toss in the trash.  So Laura decided to redo the headboard in one of her bedrooms with it.  Check it out.

Great, right? 

Here's how she did it, wish I had a few more process pics for you!

She roughed up the headboard with sandpaper so the paint would adhere better (it was just a plain wooden headboard).  Then she glued on the scallop-work that's at the top and bottom corners.  (I call that stuff gingerbread, not sure if it has an actual name). 

She painted an undercoat with a taupe base color.  Then she applied Folk Art Crackle Medium.   Next came that deep blue top coat.  She sanded the edges to expose some of the taupe base coat and then stained the edges with a wood stain.   The gingerbread got a coat of Folk Art metallic bronze paint. 

That left her at this point.  Do you see how cloudy the top coat is right now?  There are a few options to rectify that.  You can spray on sealer, which we have done many times.  I have problems with spray paint and so does Laura.  I have a really heavy hand and I almost always get a blotchy seal and drips from spray paint.  What Laura did here was brush on Modge Podge for a sealant and it worked great. 

Big difference, right? 

We just loved this custom, so we wanted to share with you.  This is an exclusive design and not for resale, but if you are ever interested in having custom work done, just shoot us an email. 

Hope the rest of your weekend is swell.  I'm sitting here getting caught up on work and listening to Ray Charles.  Doesn't get much better than that!  :)

Feature Friday: The Burlap Wreath

I've got a wonderfully different feature for you today!

Kathy from Cottage Dreams has created a wreath made of burlap and adorned the center of it with one of our stencils!

Isn't it gorgeous?  Perfect for Autumn, I get such a homey, fall feeling from it.

The backing for the wreath is actually a clock face that didn't work, so I imagine you could use just about any round board/thing, since it's just getting covered in burlap.

Great tip though, she gave the clock face a quick coat of white paint just to ensure nothing could be seen through the weave of the burlap.

After that, she stapled the burlap to the back of the clock face.

From there on, she simply used the center portion of our Le BonBon Reve stencil.  Sneaky tip, we also sell the center portion of this stencil as a 12x12 on its own.  It's called "Paris Laurel Wreath with Crown."  I know, we're so inventive with our names. 

For the actual looping of the burlap, Kathy gave a link to a great tutorial from a blog called Top This, Top That. 

The flower embellishments are from Michaels.

If you'd like to check out the original post on Cottage Dreams, click no further. 

You should most definitely check out Cottage Dreams in general, it's a beautiful blog and if you spy with your eagle eye, you'll see a stencil of ours in her banner!  :)

If you'd like to check out Le BonBon Reve or the aptly named Paris Laurel Wreath with Crown, check out our French category.  It's gigantic and wonderful. 

Thanks to Kathy at Cottage Dreams for letting us feature this wonderful wreath.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Feature Friday: The Opera Stands

Happy Friday!

I love this feature we have for you today.  I know I say that every week, but this is really a cool one.  One of our fabulous customers, Savvycityfarmer, has taken old opera stands and given them a new lease on life.

I regret that I have put one picture to show you!  They are painted with chalkboard paint in the insert and then stenciled with two of our stencils, Opera No 62 and Rive Gauche.

I remember the music stands we used in high school (yes, I was a band geek!) were very utilitarian and nothing like this.  Check out how ornate the feet are.  Love it!

We've talked about opera on the blog before, check out our Etspiration dedicated to it.

We've also featured Opera No 62 once before on a Friday.

Rive Gauche is a newcomer to Feature Friday, but expect good things from it,  Savvycityfarmer has done a few amazing projects with it and I want to feature them all!!

If you'd like to check out the original blog post, click here.   

You should totally check out her whole blog, she has the BEST STUFF.  She's also got web presence in two other locations at Shop The Shed and Stuff In The Burbs. 

If you'd like to check out either stencil in our store, browse our tres bien French Category.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Feature Friday: The Lucas Moller Breadboard

Well one canceled plane ride later, I am back from a wonderful vacation in Lake Tahoe.  I can't think of a better way to come home from vacation than with a beautiful feature for our blog.


We've been featured on a marvelous blog called AntiqueChase in the past, and I just had to share with you guys this breadboard transformation. 

Here's the before shot.  Very rustic, very well used.  I love breadboards in general, my kitchen has butcher block countertops and I have a great fondness for the feel of wood in kitchens.  But this breadboard definitely needed a little something.

That "little something" turned out to be a little craft paint and our Lucas Moller stencil.

Here's a process picture so you can see that the entire stencil isn't used.  This breadboard is definitely on the small side.  But the center portion of the stencil is perfect for the size constraints.  Check out this finished product.

It looks SO good!  AntiqueChase took a few shots of the breadboard in different arrangements in her kitchen, they all look terrific.

I am also jealous of how amazing her kitchen looks!

Lucas Moller has been featured on our blog many times.  From the Galvanized Garden Bucket to The Burlap Throw to the Green Mountain BoHo Tea Towels it's the perfect stencil for giving a hint of European Old World style.  You can check it and our other Feedsack stencils out here in the Maisondestencils store.

Here's a link to the original breadboard post on AntiqueChase.  You can also like AntiqueChase on Facebook or follow on Pinterest.

Thanks so much to AntiqueChase for letting us run this feature.  If you've got something created with a Maisondestencils stencil you'd like featured on our blog, email us!

Thanks and have a fab weekend!

Feature Friday: The Patisserie Table Runner

Hi all!

What a lovely feature I have for you today.  One of our best customers, Heidi Devlin, has created a table runner featuring our popular Patisserie design. 

 

She uses 8 feet of this wonderful aged looking canvas fabric and sews each end of the table runner into points for a more sophisticated feel.  

Here's a nice closeup of the Patisserie image.  Heidi has purchased many of our stencils over the years and she can make this table runner in quite a few different options.  But what's better than having a Patisserie in your own kitchen?

I also want to point out how nice her packaging is!  This is so very important if you are taking your business to the next level.  In my experience, customers who spend the money on handcrafted goods like the ones created with Maisondestencils have come to expect really nice packaging like this.  So props Heidi! 

Heidi has a great Etsy store you can check out. 

She also has a nice blog which you can read here.

If you're interested in the Patisserie stencil used for this table runner, here's a link to its home in the Maisondestencils store.

Patisserie has made another appearance on Feature Friday in the past.  If you'd like to check out its past iteration as a cushion, look no further. 

Have a great weekend!

Feature Friday: The Confections Table

Hello all!

We've got an awesome feature today from a great client, Andrea, in Germany.  She and Laura worked together to create a custom stencil which she then applied to a desk table.

Isn't it great!  I just love how large it is!  We've been working more and more in the 12 x 18 size range for our stencils that have a lot of type.  It makes sense when you think about it.  The smaller the stencil, the smaller all those letters are going to be. 

Laura liked the finished product so much on this design she created a few more in the same style.  This is the idea that spun forth the patisserie and boulangerie labels.

I love what Andrea did here on the chair.  She took a few lines of type from the stencil and echoed them back on the top of the chair.  There's no rulebook that says you can only use every element of a stencil once.  Go crazy!  Use phrases as many or few times as you like. 

Andrea has a blog where you can check out all the amazing furniture pieces she's rehabbed.  You can check it out here.  I've been combing through it this week prepping for this feature and I have to say, I am more than a little bit jealous that she gets to go to all the markets in Paris and look for vintage treasures. 

You can also like her on Facebook at Vintage Inspirations. 

Like I mentioned above, this was a custom stencil.  But you can check out our other label stencils here. 

In other news, we were just featured on a wonderful blog called Cozy Little House.  Thanks so much for the welcome wagon!  Everyone in the blogosphere (is it still hip to say that?) has been so friendly and helpful.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend.  Here in Astoria, it's Scandinavian Festival weekend (We have a very rich Scandinavian heritage) so it's time for my little Viking and I to check out the folk dancers, have some aebelskiver, and hopefully not any lutefisk.

Feature Friday: Green Mountain BoHo Tea Towels

Happy Friday! We've got another splendid feature from Cindy at Green Mountain BoHo! She's been making tea towels with some of our most popular designs. Check them out!

 Among the 9 million resolutions I made this New Year's, one of them was to create less paper waste.  So I am a towel fanatic and a firm believer in the fact that you can never have too many kitchen towels.  Also, I have a baby.  In other words, constant mess!  These are perfect. 

 

Here's two more she did.  One is Lucas Moller, who is a frequent flyer here on Maisondestencils.  The other is Chateau Chambord, which has not yet been featured on the blog.  Aren't these pretty?  I'd almost feel bad mopping up something with them!

 

Cindy has an Etsy store you can check out here where all these tea towels are available for sale.  She also has a facebook page you can check out.

If you'd like to check out the stencils used, click the following links:

Paris No 13
Bee with Laurel Wreath
Chateau de Cheverny
Lucas Moller
Chateau de Chambord

Our thanks to Cindy at Green Mountain Boho for use of her images.  If you'd like to have an item you created with Maisondestencils' stencil featured on our website, drop me a line here.  I'd love to feature you!

Be sure and check back tomorrow, we have a big news post rolling out with some exciting new features!

Feature Friday: The Notting Hill Pillow

We have a Brit-tastic feature for you today courtesy of Lisa @ Pickles and Cheese.  She took our popular Notting Hill stencil and made a terrific pillow out of it.

Doesn't it look great?  I don't know if it's the Diamond Jubilee or the royal wedding, but I just can't get enough of the British stuff this year.   

Lisa actually made the cushion covers out of painter's cloth, which is a great way to get a lot of cloth for not a lot of money.  Painter's cloth also has a nice look and feel if you are going for sort of a rustic decor. 

Great tip:  She slid a magazine inside the cushion cover to ensure the paint didn't bleed through to the other side. 

Notice how the stencil has paint overlap outside of the cutaways?  This is a good thing!  The number one mistake stencillers make is applying too much paint.  That can cause the paint to seep through into other areas.  No good!  For best results, start by applying your stencil brush in an up/down motion outside of the actual opening you're going to put paint through.  Does that make sense?  It's okay if the stencil gets paint on it!  That way, when you're using that stippling motion, you can just move your hand into the cutaway to apply the paint gradually. 

Here's the Notting Hill pillow hanging out with its friends.  That Wicked pillow is great too!

Check out the original blost post on Pickles and Cheese about the Notting Hill pillow.

Lisa also has a tutorial on how she made the painter's cloth cushion covers.

If you'd like to check out the Notting Hill stencil, click here.

Thanks a bunch to Pickles and Cheese for photo usage.  Her blog is really great, I highly suggest you check it out!

Feature Friday: French Book Cart

We have a very elegant feature for you today.  Blogger Little Miss Maggie shares this amazing book cart she transformed from a seriously uninspiring garage sale find.  First the finished product.

I love that this piece is black!  We see a lot of pastels here on Maisondestencils.  Don't get me wrong, they're great, but there is something timeless and classy about black.  Here's a before picture so you can see just how big a transformation this little piece of furniture made.

Super awesome Grateful Dead stickers at the bottom.  Not!  Maggie started by sending those stickers back to Jerry Garcia and then painted the whole piece Canyon Black from the Rustoleum American Accents line.

Her next step was stenciling our popular Hotel De L'Avenir stencil using acrylic ivory paint.   For a more aged look, Maggie hand painted with raw umber on top of the stencil to give a varied, uneven tone to the letters and line work.

Hotel De L'Avenir is a big stencil (12x18) and didn't completely fit on the cart.  So she used the extra text to jazz up the sides of the shelves.  Great idea!

It's always good to remember that you are not married to what we put on a stencil.  You can use as much or little of it for a stenciling project as suits your need.  But we're happy to do customs if you do need something wild and crazy.  :)

She finished up the cart by sanding and sealing with Valspar Clear Flat Spray.  It looks fabulous!

You can check out Little Miss Maggie's original blog post here.  Her whole blog is terrific, do check it out.  You can also check out the Hotel De L'Avenir stencil in our Feedsack category.

Thanks so much to Maggie for the feature this week.  Don't forget, if you've got a stenciling project you'd like featured, we're only an email away.