New ePlay Challenge - Alter a Bottle

Hi everybody, thanks for tuning in today. It's time for another ePlay Challenge over at the eclectic Paperie. Julia is our hostess with the mostest and she has chosen 'altered bottles' as the challenge theme for this month. You can see her amazing creation here. If you'd like to push your boundaries and try your hand at altering a bottle, hop over to the eclectic Paperie blog, click on the 'ePlay' button and you'll see all the details of how you can get involved. The challenge runs until the last Thursday in July and there is a $25 gift certificate for Kim's increasingly well stocked eP shop, for one lucky winner. 

I'm pretty pleased with the way my bottle turned out, as it was quite a simple process. (For anyone who tuned in earlier, you may notice that the picture has changed, this one is more true to the real colours.) The bottle used to contain a well known brand of soy sauce....here's how it started out....

I was just trying out the cork for size. Unfortunately this cork ended up in the bin. I tried to alter it using Fimo Clay. When I put it in the oven, the cork expanded and split the fimo in several places ! It was a bit disappointing as I'd spent quite a long while smoothing it down.

I created the surface pattern by stamping on to black tissue paper with Versa Mark ink and heat embossing with gold embossing powder. 

It looks a rather lovely shade of blue in this photo, but it's actually black. I used Tim Holtz's Stampers Anonymous 'Distressed Damask' stamps. This is a lovely set,  very classy. I then adhered the tissue to the surface of the bottle using Studio Gloss Multi Medium. The pieces of tissue were easily persuaded to mould to the surface of the bottle.

I used some smaller torn pieces to fill in the gaps at the top. Having ruined my first cork stopper, I needed to find another one. The only one I could find was a champagne cork, ha, ha ! that's how we roll 'round here ! (I wish !). I used a craft knife to trim it and painted it with Tarnished Brass Distress Paint. Once dry, I used one of the smaller stamps with black Archival Ink to decorate it.

I then assembled a few embellishments. The picture in the pendant, is from a digital download. I adhered it to the pendant and gave it a coat of UTEE. 

I painted  a Prima Filigree piece with Antique bronze Distress Ink and attached it to the bottle, gently bending it to follow the shape. I then adhered it with Helmar 450 Quick Dry Adhesive. This glue is great at grabbing onto things and as it says on the bottle, dries quickly. I wrapped a piece of thin gold cord around the bottle neck and added a few beads as a finishing touch.
 Now it's over to you ! Grab a bottle, any shape or size, get your creative thinking cap on and come and join us for this fun challenge. We'd love to see what you create. For more inspiration, hop over to the eP blog and you'll see what my teamies have been up to. Just wait till you see Julia's fabulous creation ! I hope you don't mind me being a little self indulgent but I'm including a picture of an altered bottle I did last year. I think they look rather good together but I definitely need to do another one x

Tim Holtz - Tarnished Brass Distress Paint	Tim Holtz (Stampers Anonymous) - Distress Demask	Claudine Hellmuth Studio Multi-Medium Gloss	Ranger Super Fine Embossing Powder - Gold	HELMAR-450 Quick Dry Adhesive
VersaMark Stamp Pad	Archival Ink - Jet Black Ink Pad