Silhouette UK: Polar Bear Luminary using Silhouette Glitter Sticker Paper

Hello, Janet here with a neat project using Silhouette's new printable media – printable glitter sticker paper. It is fabulous for stickers, of course, but today's project simply cuts the sheets to make a cute piece of home decor. I used the Polar Bears Papercut Lantern by Nic Squirrell, and the Constellation Background by Sarah Hurley. I think the glitter paper makes a very effective winter season luminary. There are details about the sheets and lots of tips and tricks in my earlier post that includes a tutorial on using the sheets with the Print & Cut technique.

SUPPLIES REQUIRED:

Silhouette Glitter Printable Sticker Paper
Silhouette Vellum
Acetate Sheet
Burnishing Tool
Heavy-Duty Double Sided Tape
LED Pillar Candle
Silhouette Cameo® 3
Inkjet Printer

HOW TO MAKE THE LANTERN

The lantern is made in three layers. An exterior layer of adhesive glitter paper features the polar bears and is layered over a vellum layer printed with the night sky. Between the two is an acetate layer to which the polar bears are adhered and which gives shape, rigidity, and shine to the lantern.

Polar Bear Luminary made with Silhouette Printable Sticker Paper by Janet Packer for the Silhouette UK Blog. Designs by Nic Squirrell and Sarah Hurley from the Silhouette Design Store.

STEP 1: Size the Lantern to Fit Your Candle

Open the polar bear design in the Silhouette Studio® software and rotate it by 90° clock-wise. As the Silhouette Glitter Sticker Paper comes in letter-sized sheets, change the paper size and orientation in Page Design Settings to 'Letter' and 'Landscape'.

Measure the circumference of your LED candle and proportionately reduce the size of the design to fit the candle and have a reasonable overlap. My candle measured 245 mm; I adjusted the size to 257 mm.

STEP 2: Make the Exterior Glitter Layer

Cut the re-sized design from the glitter sticker paper. Reduce the cut settings so that the blade makes a 'kiss cut'; cutting though the glitter layer, but not the backing sheet. Carry out a test cut to ensure that it cuts correctly. I was able to reduce the force from ten to nine.

(Optional) Add some of the stars from the constellation layer once they have been resized in Step 4.

Once cut, the unwanted interior pieces needed to be removed leaving the main part on the backing sheet.

STEP 3: Make the Acetate Layer

Make an offset of the bear design of 1.5 mm. Release the compound path and delete everything but the outline. Draw a rectangle and weld it to the bear's outline with just the bear ears protruding as shown (ignore the tab on the bottom right as it turned out to be unnecessary). Cut the acetate. Cut settings will vary according to the thickness of the acetate. I used sheets that were 240 microns, and cut them using the setting for Shrink Plastic.

STEP 4: Make the Interior Vellum Layer

Open the Constellation Background in a new tab. It is not a ready-to-print background and requires colouring first.

Ungroup the design, remaking the compound path on just the stars. Fill the stars with a very pale grey.

Fill the background with a dark blue and use a gradient fill with the lighter part at the base of the design.

Group the background and then copy it into the tab with the bear. Increase the size to the same width as the bear design. Cut off the bottom part of the design.

Print the background onto a sheet of vellum and trim it manually to fit the acetate layer (it is too large to fit within a Print & Cut window).

STEP 5: Assembling the Lantern

Remove the backing paper and adhere the bears to the acetate.

Flip it over and apply some heavy duty tape to the reverse of the bottom edge.

Remove the protective layer from the tape and adhere it to the vellum layer.

Add a strip of tape along one short edge between the vellum and the acetate layers. Adhere. Add a further line on the reverse of the vellum on the same edge.

Roll a paper napkin or some other soft item around the candle to ensure there is sufficient space between to lantern and the candle to allow the lantern to slide off the candle. Lightly roll the whole thing around the candle, overlapping the edge that has the tape on top. Remove the protective layer from the tape and adhere, burnishing firmly.

(Optional) Add cut stars to the outside aligning them with the printed ones on the vellum.

The luminary is now complete.

The bear design could be changed out for all kinds of images - penguins, swans, even fairies would look great.

I hope you'll try the glitter sticker sheets for cut projects too. Do share pictures of your make on the Silhouette UK Facebook page, we'd love to see them.

Bye for now,