DIY Patterned Stationery

Instead of buying traditional stationery, I tend to look for simple, blank note cards and envelopes. Part of the reason is because most stationery is so expensive while plain card stock is really affordable (Michaels has great deals—sometimes you can buy a set of 20 cards for a dollar or less!). But I also love blank stationery because it is customizable.

I always have a bunch of note cards laying around and when I saw this DIY on Design Sponge, I grabbed my supplies and began working. To create the patterns, all you have to do is cut triangles in painter's tape with an exacto knife and then use the strips of tape to make interesting designs on the paper. (For the pink card, you can see that I did a different, more streamlined pattern.) The DIY I followed recommends using an ink pad for the color, which I did for my red card, but for the rest I used a thin layer of spray paint. The ink pad definitely gave me the most control, and I plan to buy more of them in some fun colors, but the spray paint worked pretty well too.

The only small issue I had was that the tape stuck a little too well to the edges of my cards and there was a little bit of tearing as I took the painter's tape off. The cards I used have a very dry, natural sort of texture, so I think using a slightly more glossy paper might eliminate this problem.

I imagine that the more of these I make, the better they'll be. Perhaps I'll post a round two when I get around to buying more stamp pads and some glossier cards! What do you think? Will you give this a try?

(Come to think of it, you could apply this same technique to Kraft paper and make your own fun gift wrap.)