Security envelopes

I am wild for the subtle, printed patterns on the inside of certain envelopes. They're gorgeous, but rarely seen (except though a cellulose address-window, maybe), so it's fun to see what can be done with them by turning the envelope inside out.

A collection of paper butterflies on my wall...
and glassy "blue china" beads.From just two pre-used envelopes, I got almost 100 beads of various sizes. (If you're new to fine art of paper bead-making, there's a fantastic tutorial here) The triangles, which I rolled up around a spare piece of "music wire" I had lying around, were only about 0.5 - 1" wide by about 2" long, so it made for some very skinny beads. I ended up tearing off the last 1/4" of the skinny point since the frayed edge of the paper stayed glued down much better. I used a glue stick for the gluing, and then painted them with a high-gloss acrylic medium. This protects them against moisture, but also serves to make the colors pop a little more.

You can see what I did with these beads at Wardrobe Refashion.

Comments

laura r. said…
awesome.
envelopes are so evocative.
dare i saw,
you are
pushing the
envelope...
Anna Betts said…
Ooh!
Fantastic! Another interesting way of using the pattern of security envelopes. To say I'm obsessed with them would be an understatement! I'm trying to get people across the world to swap with me as there aome suchamazing ones out there!
Anna :)
Jenni-Raie said…
how creative of you to make beads from them!
Kim Carney said…
those are fantastic!