You want to ecoprint but flowers are scarce

You want to ecoprint but flowers are scarce

When the weather is hot (over 100 degrees daily for more than a week), it’s hard to be inspired.

It’s late August in Oklahoma. That means really hot weather with a bunch of humidity. Miserably hot.

But I need to make some art, so when I want to ecoprint, the challenge is where to find plants and flowers that haven’t burned up in the heat.

I’ve tried shopping at the box stores, but the selection is pretty narrow this time of year.

I haven’t grown my own, but I’m starting on my new garden this fall.

So, I’ve gone to local farmer’s markets the last couple of weekends.

I feel like I hit the jackpot of flowers.

I went to the Paseo Farmer’s Market in Oklahoma City.

The flower vendors I spoke to have such a passion for the goods they offer. And they are super helpful to a gardening novice like me.

I purchased a small bunch of the type of flowers that I have had the most success with: the Asteracae family. This group includes daisies, coreopsis, gaillardia, helenium. My experience with the coreopsis and gaillardia has been wonderfully exciting. The colors are beautiful.

Since I didn’t get these flowers free, I don’t want to waste a single one. I’m happy I found some lovely flowers to use for my projects.

Here’s how I ecoprinted this little bunch of flowers

I lay out each flower with its stem and leaves vertically. My plan is to make these papers into greeting cards or covers for little books.

I carefully placed each flower on the paper. Some were facing down and some were facing up. If the flower head was thick, I pushed it as flat as I could.

I layered and bundled all of the paper with the flowers between the tiles and put them over the water in the skillet. To see more about how I eco-print using flowers and leaves, see this post.

After about twenty minutes, I took the tiles out of the skillet and laid out the papers.

You can see the colors from the flowers bled through the papers. I love that flowers on one side influences the color on the next papers.

These papers are all 5.5 inch x 7.5 inch. Just the right size for greeting cards and small pieces of art.

After these dried, I picked one to use on a 4 inch x 4 inch canvas.

I cut a 4 inch x 4 inch “magic window” out of cardboard. It’s amazing how this trick focuses on the best part of the print.

I glued down the ecoprinted paper to a 4 inch x 4 inch stretch canvas. Then sealed it for protection and painted the sides of the canvas.

What are you making with your ecoprints? I would love to see what you’re doing. Please share and tell me how it’s going.

Do you want to try ECOPRINTING but don’t know where to start? Get my free supply list here.