Silhouettes Part II

As promised, here is the silhouette project I created for our living room walls. It's a bit different from Molly's design, where she spray-painted the silhouettes onto canvas, I actually used cut paper to create the profiles. I wanted a nice accent piece to compliment the colors of the living room. Right now the colors are a mish-mash of yellows and greens:

Here is a good representation of the pillows in the room.

(Sorry I don't have a very good picture of the actual living room right now, but here is some of the decor.)


I originally thought I wanted to use 3 different colors with 3 different patterned papers. Here were some of the options that didn't make the cut, but nonetheless, they are still are very pretty.

I finally chose 1 pattern and 1 color. Here was the final result:

In case you, do-it-your-selfers, wanted to know, I basically did the same thing as molly. I took side profile pictures of the "fam" then outlined them in illustrator. (You don't need to do that, but I did). Then I cut out the profiles w/an exacto knife. Once I created that template, I outlined the patterned paper with our silhouette and followed the same steps as listed above. I then slapped some black paper behind the patterned paper and, wholah, the project was complete.

You can find all the paper samples listed above at either Paper Source or Sam Flax. It seems Paper Source has a wider variety of colors and patterns, but Sam Flax is a bit cheaper. Either way, you're bound to find some yummy paper goodness between the 2 stores.

Thanks again, Molly, for your inspiration!

Inspiration Monday: Silhouette Season

It seems silhouettes are a popular trend these days. They create a unique statement and always look modern and fresh. Obviously, the idea of the silhouette as an art form has been around for ages, though in the past they seemed to have had an air of sophistication and stuffiness to them. But in the last couple years, the silhouette has been making a comeback and it hasn't just been side profiles that are popping up in home decor. Dogs, birds, people jumping, playing guitar and doing karate moves, have been showing up just about everywhere, even in mainstream stores such as West Elm:

and Anthropologie:

We hope this trend stays around for awhile. We've always been a fan and have actually created some invites with silhouettes on them. This one was for a friend's son's 1st birthday. They wanted to have a party that was kid and dog friendly:





A lovely friend of ours and author of the entertaining blog "The Nesting Game" recently sent out her Save the Dates. (A little background info on the couple: Molly is a writer for an advertising agency in Atlanta and her fiance is an art director, so we knew these Save the Dates would be fun and unique.) As soon as I saw the envelope in the mail I knew it was their STD. The invite came in a kraft envelope w/ their names and address embossed on the back flap. In retrospect, I wish I would have kept the envelope for a picture, but my husband happened to be walking into the kitchen as I was staring at the envelope, considering saving it for later, but the odd look on his face made me quickly toss it in the trash. (Sorry Molly). The Save the Date, however, was the main attraction and Jen and I knew right away we had to give a little shout out to Molly on our blog for creating such a unique STD.

A few months ago Molly had blogged about creating silhouettes for their hallway with pictures of their family. They created these colorful works of art that, of course, everyone loved:

Their Save the Date was a nice spin on the same project:

Thanks to Molly's blog and their Save the Dates I've decided to take up my own silhouette project since our living room walls are still pretty bare. I'll have to update the blog when I complete it. Until then, keep clicking on Molly's blog and checking back with us for some new inspiration heading your way.

~LGT