Graduation Event

I've been busy the past few weeks designing and making the decor for a Graduation Event that I'm styling.  I decided to go for a vintage cool classroom theme and have incorporated loads of decor ideas using vintage books and papers.
I collected all sorts of vintage text books including history, physics, music, language, plays, even a 1970 thesaurus.  I try to choose books that have a certain type of paper - quite yellowish, lots of markings and stains, and thick in texture - almost velvety to the touch.
I've used the papers in various ways.
The first idea is to stitch them together to make paper binding - which I have then folded and stitched onto hessian for a centerpiece table overlay.

stitched paper edge binding

binding with mitred corner

finished overlay.

The second style of overlay is made of stitched papers which have been hand stencilled with black gesso, and then taped onto a brown paper backing.  I've folded the edges of the backing paper back over the inlaid section to give it the nice wide edge binding.  Then I stitched all around the edge.

mixed papers including hand stencilled pages.

hard at work!

brown paper backing - with double sided tape to secure paper while stitching.

brown paper folded over the edges to become the binding.

We are having mini blackboards for the table numbers - I was going to use blackboard paint, but discovered that black gesso works well as the blackboard surface - so just painted up a whole load of cardboard and cut to size to fit the frames I sourced.

mini blackboard table numbers.

The centerpieces will be glass hurricane lamps with candles, and they will be standing on a small stack of books that I've covered with brown paper.    Each table will have 3-4 books with the family names of the people at that table printed onto the spines.

covered books packed and ready!  

Lastly, the hall will be decorated with this gorgeous bunting which I've just finished making.  I had a roll of vintage measuring tape lying around which came in handy for this!!  Each triangle on the bunting is 2 pieces of paper just to give it strength.  I tried to make sure that while putting all the papers together, that I had an interesting assortment and variety and also that there were no two of the same next to each other!  Mad!  But it looks really good.

sewing the bunting onto vintage measuring tape.

the finished bunting - with all the assorted papers.

I also designed the invitation, reply cards, DVD covers and programmes, for the event which continues the theme of the vintage/brownpaper/etc look.  

I'm looking forward to putting it all together at the event - but for now, my family and I will be happy to clear out our dining room - which has become my workshop!

Here's the final table centerpiece on the night.  I even managed to do a little matching match box with dymo tape on the front saying 'class of 2012".  Very retro!


The room looked spectacular and the styling was so well received it made all the hours and effort worthwhile.