Tando Creative: Tando Advent box by Art Angel

These advent boxes make such lovely quick projects that can be used for a whole variety of things as well making a full advent calendar for yourself or to gift

Firstly lay out all your pieces and arrange them ready to glue, you will have a box back, two sides, a top and a bottom as well as a drawer back, a base, two sides and a front

When you are confident that you have identified all your pieces and have them in the right place, glue together using a good pva glue.

One should slot easily inside the other

Next i base coated my boxes using decoart lace chalk paint

I wanted to decorate my box using rice paper, so took a sheet of A4 and split the design to work with my project

It is best to wet rice paper with a clean brush and pull apart gently where you want it to tear, this leaves a feathered edge with is much easier to blend into the background of your piece rather than having blunt cut lines

i wanted to use the top and bottom of the page to decorate the sides and top of my box as well as the sides and inside back panel of my drawer, so needed six pieces in total

I split both the top and bottom sections into three pieces each so that the design was cohesive throughout, as the bottom centre panel was the only one to incorporate a pine branch i chose this piece for the inside back panel of my drawer

I adhered the panels by applying matte medium to the surface of the box and to the reverse side of the rice paper, by coating both surfaces you have the ability to slide the paper slightly to get it in the right position, smooth out any air bubbles or creases by using a soft brush, brush from the centre to the outside edges applying even pressure

I applied the main focal image in the same way, to the drawer front

I then applied crackle paste randomly to the sides and top of the box and front panel of the drawer and left to dry, when dry i rubbed decoart metallic lustre in silver into the crackles to highlight all the cracks and along all edges.