Pineapple and AT-AT string art

Hello! Today I really felt like I needed a break from my crochet project (so. many. trebles!) so I had a look through my idea notebook and found one that said, in shaking just-woke-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night handwriting, "geometric string art AT-AT". There was also a drawing of what I assume to be the aforementioned AT-AT but it looked more like a cow. Good attempt nonetheless, sleeping-Lisa. A for effort.

So anyway I gathered my supplies, and got to crafting! It turned out well, but my desire for hitting things with a hammer wasn't yet sated, so I made another string art; this one a pineapple. I'm still not over the pineapple trend, and it works with the 70s-esque medium of string art oh so well! And I even made a little tutorial and a template for you to make your own ^___^

 

1. You'll need a hammer, upholstery tacks (or some other kind of small nail), string (I used cotton thread), a piece of wood (mine is a chopping board from IKEA), scissors, and a scalpel.

 

2. You'll also need a silhouette. For my AT-AT I used this one, and for my pineapple I made my own. If you'd like to use my pineapple silhouette, you can download it by clicking on the image above ^___^

 

3. Add your tacks around the edges of the silhouette. My pine board was soft enough that I could push in the tacks a little before hammering them in; this adds a little bit of stability and reduces the chance you'll hammer your thumb ~___^

4. Once you've got all your tacks in, you can remove the paper template. Just rip it off! ^___^

 

5. Some of your tacks might have a little bit of paper stuck underneath them. I used a scalpel to cut these little scraps off.

 

 

6. To start off the string wrapping, I did an adjustable slip knot which I tightened around the first tack. I wrapped the string around each tack around the outside of the shape and then started criss-crossing through the middle.

 

7. To finish off, I also used an adjustable slip knot. It can be a bit tricky to get the knot in the right place so that your string is kept tight enough, but it does look very neat once you get it done. ^___^

8. Cut off the tails of your strings, and you're finished! Huzzah!

 

It's still quite cloudy and rainy here, being winter, but I feel like these little bits of art cheer up the place quite nicely ^___^

I'm back at uni again next week which means that craft will, once again, be relegated to the back burner but until then I shall be working on my crochet project. I hope I can finish it in time to show you soon! 

- Lisa xx