With the lots of high-end products available today, a lot of people tend to face the trouble of finding meaningful but less expensive gifts for loved ones. As a result, more and more people are now considering personally customized household keepsakes. Among the options gradually becoming popular nowadays are magazine plaques. They can be perfect as gifts whether for birthdays, graduation, anniversary and for other special occasions.
There are a lot of materials that can be considered when it comes to making plaques. These may be made of steel or plastic but most people go for wood because this is the easiest to work on. Prior to starting on with the project, it is important to first gather all the necessary materials.
One challenge that makers will encounter through the project making is selecting which pages are to be included. It is important to remember not to consider irrelevant pages. Choosing in random will render the entire project meaningless. Great considerations are those that have meaningful messages and artistic photos. These make end results not look dull and boring.
There may be many who will opt for pre-sanded wood bases because getting these eliminates the need of sanding raw cuts. These are made available in any craft store. However, those who wish to do customization with the bases may also opt for rough wood cuts. These may be acquired from lumberyards. Rough cuts should be sanded, painted, then refinished. Course sand papers should first be used for initial sanding, followed by the fine sand papers.
Trial positioning of the pages or photos must be done as well. These should be placed on the plaque, along with the extra elements that are desired to be featured. Moving them around will help in discerning at what positions they will look best. Small pieces of masking tape may be used as marks for the corners of the elements so it will be easy to point out where they should be stuck to.
After you are done with the positioning, move on to sticking the elements in place. Remove them one after the other and apply in the glue. You can also make use of the ordinary glue but know that such may not hold out far too long. It would still be better to make use of a stronger glue, although it is also essential that you consider how thick your paper elements are beforehand.
Glue application must be done very carefully. It is important to remember to smooth the pages on the plaque after having applied the glue. After the sticking material has dried, the marks or the masking tape pieces must then be removed.
Sealing the entire plaque will have to follow next. Most will simply consider using the glues they previously used for sealing. When going for this option, it will be necessary to first try out coating pages from the magazine that will not be included in the project. If the end results are not desirable, then perhaps using another product would be better. Mod Podge or Polyurethane are most recommended.
What complete magazine plaques are the hangers. Hooks can be screwed right at the back area and wiring can be run across, winded around them. There are also other people who will make use of bright ribbons for visual appeal.
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