Papercrafting terms - explained!

Lost in a sea of crafting terms? Don't worry... Craftstash are here to help! Get the most our of your papercrafting hobby, with our useful glossary of papercrafting techniques. Maybe it'll give you a few fab ideas for your next project, too!

Brayering

Applying ink using a tool called a brayer. A brayer looks a bit like a mini paint roller and is a cylinder of rubber attached to a handle. Using a brayer, ink can be rolled onto a surface such as cardstock, allowing an even application.

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 CAS cards

Clean and simple cards - cards that have lots of white space and minimal embellishment.

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Distressing

Adding an aged look to cardstock or other materials. This can be achieved by crumpling, tearing, sanding or inking an item. It may also refer to the process of roughing up edges using a distressing tool or sandpaper.

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Dry embossing

Using either a stencil, lightbox and ball tool or an embossing folder to create a raised effect on your project.

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 Stamping off

A technique used to create images lighter than a normal stamped image, also referred to as 'ghost images', by stamping without re-inking the stamp after the initial image is stamped.

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Heat embossing

Stamping an image using a pigment (wet) ink and then covering with embossing powder and heating with a heat tool to melt, giving a metallic effect.

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Huffing

Breathing on a stamp to remoisten the ink, similar to the way you would breathe on your glasses before wiping them with a cloth. This is often necessary when using multiple colours on an image as it takes a while to apply the colour.

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Kiss stamping

Pressing one stamp (inked or uninked) to another inked stamp in order to transfer the image of one stamp to the other. This is ideal for creating patterned backgrounds and images.

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Masking

1) Stamping an image and then covering it, before stamping another image - creating the illusion that one image is behind the other. Also known as 'over stamping'. 2) Covering a portion of a project in order to keep it free of ink.

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Matting & layering

Building up your chosen image onto other papers or cardstock for effect. The Stix2 Layer Perfect is ideal to help with your matting and layering!

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Paper piecing

Stamping an image onto several different colours or styles of paper, before cutting out individual parts and then affixing them onto the main image to create a multicoloured image.

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Sponging

Adding texture to a surface with sponges of different porosity dipped in paints, inks etc.

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Stippling

Tapping a big round brush on an inkpad then tapping it on the paper to achieve an aged look.

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Triple embossing

Heat-embossing an area with three layers of embossing powder to create a thick molten layer suitable to stamp onto.

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UTEE

Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel - similar to embossing powder, but with much thicker crystals that leave a thicker coating once melted using a heat tool.

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