Topsy Turvy–October 2015 challenge at Our Creative Corner

Top of the Topsy Turvy morning to you.  Have you had a look at the October 2015 challenge this month at Our Creative Corner?  It is such a fun theme hosted by the lovely Lys. 


My design team contribution is this Topsy Turvy Top.

Let me take you through the process.  Lys challenge reads like this:  

“We often try to do the right way, use the suitable thing, organize our creations following definite lines or intentions… and sometimes it doesn’t go the way we wanted to. Sometimes it goes to the bin, sometimes we discover something new… and we love it!

On the right side or topsy turvy… Is there a right side in art?

So let’s play!:  whatever it is: upside down,  inverted, reversed or escaping from the right order…. Please show me one “topsy turvy” creation, and how it came to life in your hands!”

I have 2 very unfortunate quirks – Firstly, when I am urged by inspiration I get carried in the way in the creative moment and will splash and throw and fling paint and ink with abandon in the attempt to recreate the vision in my head to whatever medium I am applying it to.  Secondly – I will indulge the inspiration regardless of whatever nice new thing I am wearing and it almost never occurs to me, in the giddy delirium of the moment to wear some protective gear.

I had a new nice ice-white crisp t-shirt  on one day when a particularly compelling Jackson Pollack type vision overwhelmed me and I was forced to relieve the tension by acting on it.  The good news is that I was happy with inky splashes on that canvas and I did have a 75% hit rate in terms of contact between ink and canvas.  The other 25% found itself in random arrangements on my nice ice-white crisp t-shirt. 

So what I had was a t-shirt that meant to stay white but now had pretty splotches of inky paint on it.  I am also a big fan of festivals and festival gear, I was thinking the other day that I should update my festival wear.  The other thing is that I love taking things, rethinking it and then upcycling or refashioning it into something different.    When I saw Lys’ challenge, I knew that I could hit all her boxes if I would make and share the topsy turvy top idea I had in my head to give new life to my splotched t-shirt.  Plus I would have a new shirt to wear to the festival this weekend.

So here is what I did:

• I chose a graphic from a colouring page site to copy that I thought would be a funky, festival worthy and fun design to paint

• to transfer the graphic onto the t-shirt plaster the face-side of the print with Dala Picture Perfect (which is really thick Gel Medium).

• Smooth the print  (Picture Perfect side down) onto the shirt

• Wait for it to dry – the bottle recommends at least 6 hours.
• The Gel medium wicks the ink into itself and so the image is transferred onto the “glue” that is stuck to the shirt.
• Once it is dry.  Wet a paper towel and place that onto the back of the paper with the image on it.  Leave it to sit for about 5 –10 minutes.

• Rub the wet paper pulp off until you are left with just the image transfer in the gel medium – be gentle if you rub too hard you might rub the glue off of the shirt.

• Wait for that to dry.  Paint it with dye or Fabric Paint.

• Dye-paint the rest of the shirt if you want.

• If you want a funkier topsy turvy top, grab a pair of scissors and start cutting strips into the back of the shirt and interweave or braid the parts that you want braided.

• You got yourself a 2-in-1 number here.  You can wear the print in the front as a regular t-shirt (i.e TOPSY WAY) or turn it around and wear it like a stringy vest top (i.e TURVY WAY), if you are bold you can wear it over a bikini top like this and I admire you if this is the case – for me though I always wear a bandeau camisole of some sort, if that is what you were wondering.

• Isnt that fun?

So folks – cast your crafty Topsy Turvy Creation into the OCC lot this month and you could be the lucky lot drawn for a super prize from

and remember topsy your turvy, topsy your turvy gooood!

- Tincan Crafter (aka Candice) -