Splitcoast Tutorial: Heated Copper Accents

Today's tutorial is brought to us by Loll Thompson! Some of her fans requested a tutorial on one of her signature techniques - her use of heated copper on cards. I hope you'll check out her tutorial - she has some beautiful samples, and she got to use a blowtorch!

I purchased a roll of .003 mm K&S Precision Metals copper at Hobby Lobby. I wanted to try Loll's technique using my heat gun to see what effect I got... because sadly, I don't have access to a mini blowtorch. I was able to get the color of the copper to change, but it did take longer than in her demonstration, and the color contrasts aren't as sharp. It's pretty anyway - I love that pink!

I used a steel rule die from Sizzix that cuts several flower sizes, so here's a quick peek at how I cut and shaped the copper after heating it up. I cut between each petal toward the flower center with scissors...

...then used a pencil to curve each petal down. On the smaller flowers I used some round nose pliers to do this.

There are 4 different layers to the flower, put together with some hot glue.

Here's my completed project - I used Impression Obsession's House die to cut a piece of copper, heated it, then layered it over another house cut from chipboard. I stamped with Stazon ink, embossed the roof portion with a Sizzix folder. I covered a small area with white acrylic paint, and used die cut letters to spell 'home'. The branch die is from I.O. too.

That's it! If you're interested, I hope you'll give the tutorial a try - at least go see Loll's cute little blowtorch!