Spotlight on: BasicGrey

Did you know that BasicGrey sells digital designs here at the Digichick? We all were in 7th Heaven when we found out that they wanted to join the Boutique. Many of us are long time fans of their beautiful papers and elements.

I have to tell you—I think that having digital versions of my favorite BasicGrey designs is even better than having them in paper. I’ll give you five reasons why:

• Digital papers and elements aren’t “consumables.” You’ll never use them up! Ever come home from the store and think “Gee, I wish I bought more of this paper. I want to use it for something else!”? I know I have! Then I horde what I bought for fear of using it on the “wrong” project. Ack! With digital paper, that’s not a concern! You need more paper? Just print some more paper!
• Along the same lines, once you purchase a set you’ll have your favorite BasicGrey collections forever! No need to worry about something retiring. If you want to use a certain paper you love from an older collection, you’ll have it!
• You can also resize papers and elements to your heart’s content! Cardmakers and papercrafters love BasicGrey’s 6 x 6 packs of paper because the smaller patterns look better on their projects. Well, with digital paper, you can decide to make something 8 x 8 or 6 x 6—whatever size you need, you can easily make it that way!
• Best of all, you can use digital kits with your cutting files and hybrid templates! It makes hybrid projects quick and easy. Just open a digital file, drag it into your template and print. It’s a piece of cake!
• And of course, you can also use BasicGrey’s digital kits to make digital or hybrid layouts, too! I like to print off BasicGrey’s pretty tags to use on my scrapbook pages.

I would have to say that all of BasicGrey’s collections include hybrid-friendly selections. Here are my top picks from the Boutique:

Now for some eye candy from the gallery! Our Hybrid Chicks love using BasicGrey papers for card making. First up, here’s a gorgeous card from Sylvia, using the Mellow Starter Kit:

And here’s a beautiful card from Sharyn, using the Blitzen Starter Kit:

I was excited to get a chance to make some BasicGrey hybrid goodies, too!

I picked out The Tag Bag Collection: Hybrid Templates and Cutting Files by our newest Hybrid Designer, Geeky Diva and I got to work! I wanted to make little gift bags to use for those times when I want to give someone a gift card. Gift cards themselves are often so small in size… I thought that some pretty handmade bags would be the perfect thing to make these gifts even more special!

For my first set of boxes, I used one of my all time favorite BasicGrey kits, Blush:

I used one paper for the front and the two sides and then a second paper for the back, to give it a little more interest. And I shrunk these papers to about 65% of their original size so that I could get more of the patterns on my bags.

I was also super excited to make some of The Cutting Files’ Paper Roses to go with this bag! I don’t have a cutting machine, so I did these by hand which was incredibly easy.

I love how they turned out! I printed three extra sets of roses with different papers to play with later. LOL!

I had watched Mari’s tutorial, which was so helpful. Here it is, if you haven’t seen it! But beware—once you know how easy these are to make, you will be addicted:

For my next set of boxes, I used the Mellow Starter Kit:

I’m so happy with how these bags turned out! I even found a place for them in my cabinet:

Now the next time I need a little bag for a little gift, I can just come to my craft room and grab one! How easy is that?! They are all ready to go. Fun!

Hope you enjoyed this look at BasicGrey’s yummy goodies in action and I hope you feel inspired to make a little something as well. Be sure you don’t miss out on our “For the Love of Hybrid” event this weekend! Hope to see you in the forums.

Happy crafting!

Other Articles by Nicole Seitler:

• For the Love of Hybrid! - February 24th, 2011
• Spotlight on: Jennifer Fox Designs - November 20th, 2010
• Make your own Autumn Centerpiece - November 8th, 2010
• Spotlight on: Dysfunctional Design - September 25th, 2010
• Spotlight on: Karen Lewis Designz - August 28th, 2010