Defining Colors and Design

Here they are, one large and three smaller mini-birdhouses. They
all use the same colors and "fabric" designs but you would never
know it!

While I have been creating, if you will, a series of eclectic birdhouse designs, my first claim to fame was a contest I won back in 2012. I was taking painting classes from a teacher who was also a DecoArt instructor and she encouraged me to enter one of the new style birdhouses I had come up with.

   I had started craft painting in my 50's as a way to relax from my graphic design business by following my roots - you see my Dad was German. When I started to paint birdhouses as a way to relax I was drawn to Pennsylvania Dutch folk art. You see "Dutch" was a corruption of "Deutsch" the name for Germany. Leave it to the English, right? Anyway I got some books, studied German folk art and began creating my own designs.

As any craft painter knows, neatness is on the bottom
of your need to do list. It took over 30 paint colors to
create 4 birdhouses.

   Never one for staying in the same mold, I began to play around with other designs, got books from the library, took classes in Vegas picking up more books on the subject and taking classes as well.

   Since my wife at the time was a quilter, I would look at her quilt patterns and decided that they could also be considered folk art designs. My first attempt at this, a style I called "Crazy Quilt" was very geometric but I decided that like a quilt, each time I used a background color, I would put the same "painted" pattern on it. I started then with a geometric Crazy Quilt!

   My teacher heard about a contest DecoArt was sponsoring around the country for craft designs using their materials. I was reluctant but she encouraged me to enter this first attempt. First I found out my birdhouse was reduced to three national finalists and while on a cruise to Alaska found out, docked in Juneau, Alaska, that I had won. There was no cash but several boxes of paints, stencils, brushes and the like. I was both surprised and elated. I was on my way. 

Here you can see the base colors
and the starting of the color pattern

   Over the following years I tried a more random kind of crazy quilt following the rules that every base color would have the same pattern painted on top. I painted birdhouses, boxes, trays, sewing boxes, dishes and many have sold on my Etsy store. I also found out that the brighter or lively they were, the more they would most likely sell. In fact, I had been using a tissue box I had painted a few years back and looking at it several weeks ago thought, well, why not put it in the store? I did and it sold a day later.

Here is the same birdhouse finished.

   As I struggle to get productive again, I came back to my love of the crazy quilt idea and remembered the box that sold had been painted in a kind of rainbow, meaning that each side of the tissue box had a difference main color starting: red, fading to orange, fading to yellow, fading to green with blue and purple on the top. It made for an interesting box because no matter what side you saw at any time, the colors seemed to belong. I always made sure a color from another side flowed into a new color way.

Same exact colors as red base but
started in a different sequence  with
a dark base.

Even changing the base color made
a vast difference

   Realizing that I had three small six sided, or mini birdhouses and found, in my huge stash, a larger 6-sided footed birdhouse I decided to follow the idea of the tissue box. Here with six sides it was much easier.      On the large birdhouse I reversed the 6 colors top and bottom then used the exact same colors on three, hanging, mini-birdhouses that followed the same sequence of red to purple on top and bottom. While it was complicated at least I could paint on all four in sequence and when I got to the end and started the next base color or pattern, the first one was now dry!

This top view gives you a view of most of the
color ways and the patterns each base color had.

   Generally I had about 5 colors per base color way and had to be sure that at least one would invade the next color way so that it looked continuous no matter how you looked at it. And I can certainly say that each color way was repeated on every single one of the 4 birdhouses ... yet, I was amazed at how different they looked. I did not follow the same pattern of the quilt fabrics only followed the base colors and patterns of each one.

   The final, and believe me, the most tedious step was "stitching" the fabrics together. I tried a gold gel pen but on wood and acrylic paint even water washed most of the "sewing" off. This time I got a very fine liner brush and painted it on using gold paint. I hate this part the most and for awhile used a gold fingernail paint pen that gave me consistent gold lines but I have been unable to find the product I originally used. Not happy with the fading or washed out ink finally painted the stitches on today. Well, if there is anything good about this, you won't have to worry about the fabric fading or the thread unraveling!!!

Its all in the details!

   It does keep you busy and as a friend noted today, I should stick with the larger birdhouses as it takes about as much time on the small ones as the large ones. He was right. They do. In fact those small buggers probably take more time and people can't seem to understand why you ask so much for something so small. I can tell you. THEY TAKE JUST AS MUCH TIME ... maybe more!

   The final paint step is what I call antiquing. I use a dark brown wash on all the edges or corners. That tends to tone down brighter colors and actually makes even discordant colors harmonize. This time I "antiqued" all but one. Which one will be most popular? I don't know. Guess I will have to let the marketplace decide on Etsy. One thing is for sure, while they may have all used the same colors you would never tell!

Thank you for reading my blog. I invite you to take the time to read earlier blogs where the emphasis is to explore the ways art and design affects our daily lives ... and always has. I share with you what inspires me with the hope that it will inspire you as well. Comments are always welcomed! 

Be sure to check my ETSY store ... KrugsStudio.etsy.com. I am adding many new and exciting, collectible products. Many of the items talked about here will be for sale there!