Je t'aime vintage look French perfume card—and IBSIC #41

Playing along with IBSIC #41 today. I went with a shabby, vintage theme. One good thing about this look is it's hard to mess up. You might have noticed there are not too many pure white cards on this blog. Reason being white cards do not stay white in my studio. Smudges seem to cling to them tighter than Jennifer Lopez's last Oscar night dress. No matter how hard I try to keep them clean they will get smudged. With a shabby distressed look, if it smudges, you just say that's part of the design!

I've got some vintage lace along the bottom of the center image. I have very little of this one left so I use it sparingly. It's my favorite. A friend in the States gave it to me and it looks homemade. It has some bad (or in my case good) staining that makes it all the more adorable. The center image is an Aladine stamp I use quite often. It looks like an old ad for French perfume. Both it and the Florilèges Je t'aime stamp are stamped on old book paper. A note aside—always save the blank end pages of old books. They're great to stamp on or you can trim any rough edges and run them through your printer. I have a file just for this type of paper.

 With the heart clip and the Je t'aime tag this could easily be an alternative Valentine's Day card.

The Artoz paper flowers I layered and pressed a pearl in the center to give them more volume. The metal corner looked all nice and new so I rusted it with Sophisticated Finishes's rust antiquing set. All the edges were distressed with my Distrezz-it-all and sewn down.

And here's the lovely inspiration photo.

Material

Paper—Light brown and tan cardstock, Toga Romance 10, London Market, vintage sheet music, vintage book pages.
Stamps—Florilèges Je t'aime, Aladine vintage look French perfume label.
Embellishments—Artoz flowers, Folia pearls, heart clip, metal photo corner, vintage lace, burlap thread.

Cards