Chapter XXXV Stencil Painting and How to Make the Stencils
You need not be an artist to do the painting or to make the stencils. It is all easy enough and, because of the real beauty of the work and the number of purposes to which it may be applied, stencilling is growing more and more popular.
With the stencil you can decorate a window curtain, portière, table cover, bedspread, bureau scarf, screen or the walls of your room. You may even paint the trimmings for a dress if you like; it has been done.
Stencilling is effective on almost any material: silk, cotton, linen and wool. Swiss and cheese-cloth sash curtains are particularly attractive decorated in this way, and swiss bureau and pin-cushion covers are very dainty. The drawing on page 427 is of a white cheese-cloth short sash curtain stencilled in pink and light apple-green. Both dye and oil paints may be used, but for anything washable
Dyes
are the best, inasmuch as they are supposed to be fast colors. There is an inexpensive dye now on the market that comes in tubes like oil paint and does not require boiling. This is convenient to handle, as it is merely necessary to dissolve it in water. Tapestry dyes may also be used but are much more expensive. Heavy, non-washable material may be stencilled with oil colors. The color is not used as a paint but as a stain and must be entirely dissolved in turpentine to make it flow easily. Our first drawing shows
A Portière
made of heavy unbleached sheeting stencilled in a Persian pattern with dull-red, moss-green, yellow and black. Curtains may also be made of denim, crash, burlap and a number of other materials. The simplest way to
Make Your Stencil
if you have no especial ideas of your own to carry out, will be to select a graceful embroidery pattern or one intended for decorative painting and adapt it to your use. With a little practice this becomes quite easy. The principal things to remember are that a good stencil design should be simple, bold and conventional; the unbroken lines must not be too long nor the spaces to be cut out too narrow, between the cut-out parts there must be space wide enough to hold firmly. It is also necessary to break the lines once in a while with little bridges.
Suppose we take the pattern (Fig. 633). To make it into
A Design for Stencilling
we must cut off connections and separate it into many parts, at the same time keeping the effect of the long curves. Beginning with the flower we will separate the petals and calyx (A, Fig. 633, and A, Fig. 634), and widen the stem (B, Fig. 633, and B, Fig. 634). Instead of continuing the curve we will break it at C and D, with two little bridges. This divides the stem into three parts, and, to give variety and interest to an otherwise monotonous line, we will widen the first and second parts of the stem at the lower ends, curving the wide end inward and rounding the end of the next section to give the idea of its fitting the joint. The suggestion of the various parts fitting together in stencil designing is the means of carrying the eye over necessary bridges or intervening spaces and conveying the impression of continuous lines. The third section of the stem, where it disappears under the flower in Fig. 633, we will bring to a point in Fig. 634 to indicate its vanishing behind the flower. The buds which fill in the curve of this stem in Fig. 633 we will leave out altogether, for they would crowd the design. We will conventionalize the leaves, dispense with the small stems, broaden the main leaf stem, separate it from the flower stem and curve each end, one to fit the base of the end leaf, the other to follow the curve of the flower stem.
This furnishes one section of the pattern; the rest is but a repetition of the same, which is reversed as the curves alternate.
Now for the making of the stencil.
Fig. 635 is a section of the design, actual size, which you can use immediately, without waiting to develop a design for yourself.
Take a piece of smooth white tissue paper, lay it over the pattern (Fig. 635) and, with a very soft lead pencil, trace the pattern carefully. Fig. 635 is reversed, especially for tracing. Have ready a perfectly smooth piece of heavy Manila wrapping paper seventeen inches long and seven inches wide. With the aid of a ruler draw two straight lines lengthwise across the paper, the first line two and a half inches from the top edge of the paper (E, Fig. 636), the next one and three-eighths inches below the first line (F). One-half of an inch above the first line E draw another line (G), and one-half of an inch below the line F draw another line (H).
Lay the tracing, pencilled side down, on the wrapping paper, with the upper and lower curves of the flower stem just fitting between the lines G and F (Fig. 637). Transfer the tracing to the wrapping paper by going over the lines of the design with your soft pencil; then turn the tracing over and bottom edge up to reverse it and lay it again on the paper, this time with the curves of the flower stem between the lines E and H, and go over the lines of the design again with your soft pencil. Once more reverse the design and bring the curves of the flower stem between the lines G and F. This last section will finish the pattern. In reversing the tracing always allow one-quarter of an inch space between the tips of the two flower petals I and J (Fig. 637), and the leaf K (Fig. 637).
With a pair of sharp scissors
Cut Out Your Design
taking great care to keep within the outlines, for a snip beyond will let in color in the wrong place and spoil your stencil. Remember you are not to cut the paper away from the design but cut the design out leaving the surrounding paper intact. This makes the stencil (Fig. 638). When all of the design is cut out place your stencil flat on a board and give it a coat of white shellac, then lift it and move to another place on the board to prevent its sticking. When quite dry turn the stencil over and shellac the other side. Be sure the edges of the cut-out parts are covered with shellac as well as the rest of the paper. The shellac makes the paper waterproof and durable. Do not use the stencil until it is absolutely dry.
Trace Fig. 639 which is the conventionalized flower, and transfer it to the centre of a four-inch square of the wrapping paper, or make the flower smaller if you prefer to have it the size of the one in the border. Cut out the design and shellac the little stencil as you did the larger one (Fig. 640).
The closer the weave of the cloth the easier is the work of stencilling, but the dye penetrates entirely through thin material, and the effect is so attractive I will describe the
Cheese-cloth Curtains
and the process given for stencilling these will answer for any other material.
One width of cheese-cloth for each half of the short Dutch curtains is sufficient for quite a wide window. If the curtain is too full much of the effect of the decoration is lost.
Select the finest quality of cheese-cloth and cut it the required length. Hem the bottom edge and lay the curtain, right side up, smoothly on a lap-board with the hem at the top. Place your stencil on the curtain so that the design will be about one inch and a half from the hem. Slide a new piece of blotter paper under the curtain to absorb the extra moisture, then tack the stencil down with rather small pins. Drive a pin in the centre of each flower, at the point of each petal and at the point of each leaf, between the petals and between the leaves, also in every bridge and along the edges of the design wherever the paper is inclined to lift (Fig. 641). In short, your endeavor must be to keep the stencil perfectly flat on the cloth so that the dye will not penetrate beyond the openings and blur the outlines.
Before tacking the stencil in place
Make Your Dye Ready
Buy a tube of olive green dye, one of yellow and one of cardinal red. Squeeze about a teaspoonful of dye into a teacup, add two tablespoonfuls of boiling water, stir until dissolved, then add enough boiling water to give the desired shade. You can test the depth of color by dipping bits of white cloth in the dye. Each dye must be in a separate cup and a little yellow should be added to the green after it is dissolved, but before it is diluted with the extra water. Have ready
Two Stiff Bristle Brushes,
such as are used for oil painting, and a piece of old white muslin. With your stencil in place, take the board on your lap, set the dye on a stand at your side and lay the old muslin folded on the board above your curtain. Dip a brush in the dye and rub it on the muslin to remove some of the moisture, for a brush too wet will cause the dye to spread and spoil the outline of the design.
Beginning at the left hand of your stencil, scrub the cheese-cloth in the openings of the design until it becomes the right shade and the dye sinks entirely through the cloth. The flowers must be pink and the leaves green, but you can make the flowers darker at the centre if you wish by applying more color. Use separate brushes for the green and red dye. Hold the brush firmly and in an upright position.
When you have stencilled the entire design
Pull Out the Pins,
move the stencil farther along on the curtain, tack it down and continue stencilling until the border is finished; then take the small stencil of the single flower (Fig. 640) and stencil the flower at irregular intervals over the curtain. For
The Tassels
which finish the curtains use cheese-cloth colored with the green dye. Cut a strip of cheese-cloth two and a half inches wide, spread it flat on the board and paint it with the dye, using your bristle paint brush for the purpose. When the cloth is dry cut it into pieces four inches long. Dye a number of strands of white linen floss, or use green linen or silk floss for tying the tassels.
Fold one piece of the dyed cheese-cloth crosswise through the centre and crease it (Fig. 642). Thread a coarse needle with a strand of the floss and run it through the crease, leaving several inches of the floss at each end (Fig. 643). Draw the material into gathers and tie securely (Fig. 644). Then bring the two ends together. Make a loop of the floss about one inch long (Fig. 645), and fasten by taking one or two stitches in the gathers. Open the fold, bring the ends of the floss on the underside of the tassel, tie close to the gathers and cut off the ends. Run another gathering thread across each half of the tassel, half an inch below the gathers at the top (Fig. 646). Draw the thread tight, wrap it around several times to form the neck (Fig. 647), and fasten with several stitches. Cut the floss close to the wrapping and with the scissors trim off the bottom of the tassel until it is perfectly even (Fig. 648). Sew the tassels several inches apart on the bottom edge of the curtains, as shown in illustration. When the curtains are
To be Laundered
soak them for an hour or more in a strong solution of salt and water, then wash carefully in the suds of a pure white soap and rinse thoroughly. Do not rub the soap on the material, and before putting the curtain in water shake and brush out all loose dust. Dry in the shade.