Block printing

Meine Sammlung mit selbst geschnitzten Stempeln

Block Printing for Beginners

You can easily make beautiful and very personal stamps yourself! With your own stamps, you can decorate homemade cards, stationery, envelopes, homemade wrapping paper, and fabric.

In block printing, the design is carved into stamp rubber, which is then inked and printed onto paper or fabric. The plates are easy to work with and are excellent for beginners.

Links

> In my shop, you'll find the DIY Stamp Set. It contains everything beginners need for their first stamps.

> In this YouTube video, you can watch me carve stamps.

What you'll need*

Stamp Rubber
There are many different types of stamp rubber. I use sheets from Factis (blue and brown) and Speedball (pink). Broadly speaking: The pink sheets are the softest, the blue ones are a bit firmer, and the brown ones are even firmer and more suitable for experienced carvers. In principle, beginners can also use all sheets.

Speedball Stamp Rubber (pink) [Affiliate Link*]
Factis/Milan Stamp Rubber (blue) [Affiliate Link*]
Factis Stamp Rubber (brown) [Affiliate Link*]


Knives
Perhaps you have an old linocut carving set lying around at home? That is perfectly sufficient for your first stamps. Otherwise, there is also a wide selection of carving knives available. I recommend the following:

For beginners:
Speedball Lino Cutter Set [Affiliate Link*]
Rico Design Carving Tools [Affiliate Link*]

For advanced users:
Pfeil Linocut Knives (in various designs) [Affiliate Link*]


Ink
For starters, a simple ink pad is completely sufficient. If you want to make higher-quality and larger prints, I recommend linocut ink (for example Aqua Linol by Marabu [Affiliate Link*] )

Instructions

In addition to the stamping mat, knife, and ink, you will also need:

> a pencil

> your desired design - printed or pre-drawn

> scissors and/or a craft knife as needed

Transferring the motif to your stamp mat
To transfer a printed motif to the stamp mat, trace over the printout with a soft pencil. Then place the traced printout face down (i.e., with the printed side down) onto your stamp mat. Now rub over the paper. You can do this with your fingers, an eraser, or the wooden handle of a carving knife. This transfers the pencil drawing to the stamp mat. If you like, you can trace over the lines again on the stamp mat.
Since this process involves mirroring twice, print your motif exactly as you want the stamped impression to appear later.
Böockprinting: Eulen-Stempel aus Stempelmatte mit Schere grob ausschneiden

Roughly cut out your basic shape from the stamp mat. This can be done with scissors, one of the straight carving knives, or a scalpel.

Böockprinting: Eulen-Stempel aus Stempelmatte ausschneiden

First cut along the outline of your motif with a fine knife, then with a coarser knife.

When cutting with the knives, try to cut away from yourself as much as possible. For curves, try to rotate the stamping mat accordingly instead of cutting in different directions with the knife.

As little or no edge as possible should remain, as this can leave unwanted marks during printing.
Eulen-Stempel: Mit einem Messer Feinheiten schneiden

Cut lines and shapes into the rubber as desired. Where you cut something out, no stamp ink will adhere, and thus there will be no impression in these areas. You can brush away fine rubber remnants from the stamp mat, for example, with a toothbrush.

Once you're happy with your stamp, you either press it onto an ink pad – as you would with any stamp –oryou place it face up and dab ink onto the stamp with the ink pad. The latter is recommended if the stamp is larger than the ink pad.

Place the stamp face down on a piece of paper and press it firmly onto the paper everywhere.

Tip: Not at all necessary, but much loved by me: With the Speedball Baren [Affiliate Link*] you can press firmly and evenly.

With the first prints, you might see where your impression isn't quite right yet. If you want to make further corrections, you can rework the stamp until you are completely satisfied with your impressions.

If you like, you can glue the processed stamp mat onto wood with a backing – there are special blanks, or you can use a simple wooden disc. However, this step is not necessary. I always use my DIY stamps without a backing.

Enjoy block printing!

Enjoy crafting!

Love, Kathrin

Inspiration

Picture 1: For your first stamp, start with a small piece of stamp rubber and carve any pattern into it. Printed repeatedly, this creates a great pattern. Perfect for wrapping paper!

Picture 2: Block printing is perfect for handmade cards.

Picture 3: In reduction printing, you print multiple colors on top of each other using one printing plate. For each layer of color, another part of the plate is cut away.
Einfache Stempel: Quadrat mit Stern

Disclaimer

* This article may contain affiliate links to Amazon. All affiliate links are marked as such. "Affiliate link" means that I may receive a small commission if you click this link and then make a purchase on Amazon. This helps me to continue providing free craft tutorials in the future.

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