Gelli Arts® Embossed Poster Board Texture Plates by Birgit Koopsen

Hi! Welcome to the Gelli Arts® blog, it’s Birgit here today with a fun new project. Use your embossing folders to create great and lasting texture plates to use on your gel plate.

In the past months, I’ve shared a couple of times how I used my embossing folders to create textures on the gel plate. I mentioned that I had forgotten about the folders and came across them while moving my studio. As I didn’t use them anymore for embossing, I didn’t care if they got covered in paint, and I just used them straight onto the gel plate.

But, of course, you might still be using them for embossing and don’t want them to get dirty. The first solution would be to emboss cardstock and use that on the gel plate. It works! However, because the cardstock is very flexible, you are likely to push the lower parts into the paint, losing parts of the texture. Or, the moisture in the paint will be soaked up by the paper, which will also cause a loss of texture.

But here is the solution! Poster board, also called foam board, is a lightweight board often used for presentations. It consists of two sheets of smooth paper with a thin layer of foam in between. It is sold in quite large sheets but is very easy to cut with a craft knife. It’s quite sturdy and holds the textures very well, making it a durable solution for embossed textures that can be used over and over again.

Watch the YouTube tutorial here: https://youtu.be/EX-ylsaF6C0

To create the texture plates, you start by measuring the size of your embossing folders and cutting pieces from the large poster board. Then, you place a piece of board in the embossing folder and run it through a die cutting machine. Most die cutting machines like f.i. Sizzix, Cuttlebug and Spellbinders have an embossing option. Any embossing folder you think would make a nice texture on the gel plate can be used.

If you want to create a more collage/quilt kind of look you can apply paint in just a smaller area of the gel plate, print with one of the textures, then apply paint in the next smaller area and so on. Let the paint dry before adding a pick up layer in any color(s) you like.

Another fun way to block print is to create a “quilt” texture plate. Cut a couple of the texture plates into smaller pieces (or create textures with smaller leftover bits from the poster board) and create a collage, then glue them to a piece of chipboard. To add different colors to the various texture blocks on the gel plate, you can cover the surrounding area of a block with copier paper before applying the paint. Make sure each painted block is dry before placing paper on top; otherwise, the paper will lift up the paint. This way, color all of the blocks.

Make sure all of the paint is dry before adding the pick up layer. Using white is the best way to not change any of the colors you used for the blocks.

I prefer to leave the paper on the plate until everything is completely dry. This way I can be sure all of the print will be lifted up without leaving any paint behind.

Removing larger and/or sturdier (heavy) paper from the plate it is easier to just turn everything over and peel the plate from the paper instead of pulling the paper from the plate.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and we would love to see what you create, so please share and don’t forget to tag @gelliarts and use #gelliarts so we can find your posts!