Inspiration Gallery: Quilling
By TwistieI wonder how many of you were taught quilling as children. I was taught about it in art class as a kid, and it appealed pretty strongly to me at the time. All those little curls of paper turning into pretty pictures made me kind of happy. I think we made snowflakes to put on Christmas cards for our parents. Mine did not turn out anywhere near as nice as this:
… but I really enjoyed doing it.
As it worked out, though, I haven’t done it since. But now that I’m writing this blog, I find myself thinking about how fun it was and what more exotic ways I could use the technique these days with my improved fine motor skills and more sophisticated imagination.
And so I went looking for some cool ideas around the web. Here are some of the goodies I found.
This is a classic sort of project. I love the lines of it. If you like it, too, check out the free instructions here. No really, take a look. They have lots of charming free quilling patterns.
Of course, you may not want something traditional. You might want something new and unique. In that case, take a look at this:
I found it at A Skull a Day. The artist made it out of shredded documents, which just adds to the fun in my not so humble opinion.
I hadn’t really considered the fact that quilling could go 3-D, but luckily someone else did have the imagination to come up with the idea.
Alas, the Quilling Guild (UK) doesn’t give instructions on how to make this amazing quilled owl, but there’s no end of inspiration to be found on their website.
Sometimes it’s good to take a look at a long-forgotten craft to see if you can find something new in it. Quilling is now officially back on my radar. If it’s back on yours and you need some help getting started, check out these basic quilling instructions at the Origami Resource Center.
November 22nd, 2010 at 1:22 pm
I love to quill, but had never heard of it until I was an adult. The owl is especially remarkable, but all of the examples are great.
November 24th, 2010 at 11:07 am
Ooh, makes me want to try this!
November 25th, 2010 at 3:05 am
I very much want to try quilling. I have some very old quilled snowflake Christmas tree ornaments and they’re beginning to show signs of wear, and I’d love to supplement them with some new ones.
November 25th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
@Accidental Tangoiste: Do try it out! It’s fun!
@Zaftig Wendy: Sounds like a great project. If you do it, I hope you’ll let us know how it turns out.
@Ann: And that’s just a fraction of the brilliant designs going on.