Craft Stamper Magazine

Blog of Craft Stamper - the UK's number one stamping magazine!

Stamper of the Year Sponsors - Craft Obsessions

This week we are shining the spotlight on Craft Obsessions, who are kindly sponsoring our brand new Scrapbooker of the Year category for 2010.Craft Obsessions is run by Brenda & David Rose and has been trading since December 2005. They specialise in scrapbooking products but also carry lots of stamps and stamping-related lines too. They are proud of their reputation for providing excellent ... Read more

NEW free classifieds service on our website

Just a note to let you know about a new feature on the CS website - so new in fact we have no listings as yet! It's a free classified service, where readers can offer unwanted stamps or stamping-related goodies for private sale.If you are into sewing, patchwork or beading you can look at/post to listings for those magazines also.You can access the free classifieds here.... Read more

Crafty Individuals interview

Artwork by Jean HardyFollowing on from our article yesterday, I had a chat with the lovely Jean from Crafty Individuals to find out more about the brains behind this successful stamp company.1) Tell us a bit about yourself and your background."Malcolm has had over 25 years experience as a professional commercial photographer, and my background is mainly in fine art and crafting."2) How did you ... Read more

Stamper of the Year sponsors - Crafty Individuals

Crafty Individuals are kindly sponsoring our main overall winner category this year. The prize they have supplied is amazing - the winner won't believe the sheer quantity of gorgeous product!Continuing our series of profiles, here's a little more info about Crafty Individuals.Crafty Individuals is UK-based and run by business partners Malcolm Noble and Jean Hardy. They have been trading as an ... Read more

New challenge blog

Jennie from The Artistic Stamper is hosting a new blog - Artistic Stamper Creative Team. As well as lots of lovely samples from Jennie, CS regular Hels, and the rest of the creative team, there is also a monthly challenge which anyone can join. For this month's challenge there is a prize worth £15 up for grabs for one participant - even more reason to join in!If you love all things inky, arty and... Read more

SOTY sponsors - The Stamp Man

This year the Cardmaker of the Year category in our Stamper of the Year competition is sponsored by The Stamp Man, a veritable treasure trove of stamps run by the lovely Jill Tuck who you will not doubt have seen on TV and who was responsible for the absolutely stunning UTEE clock in this month's issue. As part of our competition launch we'd like to tell a bit more about some of our sponsors, ... Read more

Stamper of the Year - yay!!!

Well as you will have no doubt noticed the September issue of CS is now on sale. We always launch our Stamper of the Year competition in this issue and this month you can expect lots of blog posts about the competition and all our lovely sponsors.Full details of the competition are in the magazine and there are also some details here on the website. This year you only have to submit two examples ... Read more

Sneak Peeks!

With the next issue due on sale soon (6th August) I thought I'd tease you a bit with a couple of sneaky peeks at the content! These pictures are from two of my personal favourite projects from the magazine - both stunning, though completely different in style.We also have a new feature starting up in the Sept issue called 'Designer's Palette' which will focus on colour schemes, with a little nod ... Read more

Inspired by Craft Stamper

Do you enjoy seeing other people's interpretations of projects from Craft Stamper? I know I do and if you are the same way inclined, do pop over and have a look at a blog called Craft Stamping Quartet.Via this blog, four friends craft together, choosing a project from Craft Stamper as their inspiration each month. The artwork produced is lovely and it's interesting to see the different approach ... Read more

Can you guess what I've been doing today?

I've been prepping all the info for the STAMPER OF THE YEAR 2010 competition! Woo hoo!I love this competition as we always get a great response and opening all the packages full of yummyness is one of the highlights of my year.This year we've got four categories in the competition:-Stamper of the Year (overall winner);-Cardmaker of the Year;-Altered/Mixed Media Artist of the Year;-Scrapbooker of ... Read more

The Digi Debate

Digital stamping is becoming more popular lately, with lots of companies moving into the digital field or offering digi versions of their 'real' stamps.I've been holding back on including digi stamps in the magazine as I am not sure about how our readership would feel about them. What do you think?For me, in the same way as I could never get into digi scrapbooking, I like the feel of real ... Read more

Introducing...

...Morag Cutts!Morag is another new member we are welcoming to the design team this month. I know Morag from her absolutely stunning scrapbook pages (she guested on our Stamping for Scrapbookers feature in the June issue) but she also does some beautiful stamping work too. Morag will be an occasional contributor to the magazine, and her next feature, for the Sept issue, is a stunner. That's all I... Read more

New issue out today

Oh dear, I seem to have not managed to blog for a whole month. Must try harder...Today is official on-sale date for a brand new issue of Craft Stamper. August issue is now on sale and full of bright, summery projects to bring a smile to your face. There are lots of things to enjoy but my favourite this month is Gail Milburn's adorable ribbon reel cakes. Guess who has something else to squirrel ... Read more

Latest issue now on sale

Hello peeps,Just a quick note to let you know that the July issue is on sale now (official on-sale date is today).The cover project is by Trish Latimer and it's a brilliant tutorial on making your own stamps by carving rubber blocks. I am really keen to try this out myself! Our free stamp is designed by the lovely Jean Hardy from Crafty Individuals and it is rather nice I think - I have a real '... Read more

Thinking about subscribing?

Here's a peek at our lovely subs gift for this month, which is an exclusive stamp set from Lavinia Stamps.I know many of you are big fans of Lavinia Stamps so we were delighted when Tracey agreed to put this pretty collection together for us.You can now subscribe online too - details are here.Best wishes,Katy... Read more

Celebrate our birthday with us!

As you probably know, Craft Stamper celebrated ten years in print with our June 2010 issue. Pictured is a beautiful memento that Helen Chilton made for me to commemorate the event. It's all made up of images from the magazine and I shall treasure it always - thank you Helen :). Now it's your turn to help us commemorate this milestone in CS history! As part of our celebrations we ran a great ... Read more

Please welcome...

...another new addition to the Craft Stamper DT, Joanne Wardle.Joanne has appeared as a guest in CS several times, and I thought it was about time I asked her to join the DT proper as she has always produced exceptional quality work and is very punctual too (more important than you might think with deadline after deadline in this business!).Joanne amazes me with her ability to make her projects ... Read more

Calling all scrapbookers!

You may or may not know that Isabelle Norris, one of the Craft Stamper DT, is a very talented scrapbooker. She has recently started up her very own scrapbooking challenge blog - Scrap, Theme & Sketch - the idea behind which is to get you scrapbooking more with a whole host of prompts to get your creative juices flowing.The challenge are varied including Book of Me, clean and simple, sketches and ... Read more

Birthday Promotions at Happy Stampers North West

PLEASE NOTE THIS EVENT IS SOLD OUT. HOWEVER IF YOU HAVE TICKETS PLEASE COME TO THE CS STAND TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF OUR PROMOTIONS :).Are you lucky enough to be going along to the HSNW show at Port Sunlight this Saturday (8th May)? If you are then be sure to pop along to the Craft Stamper stand as we are celebrating our 10th birthday this year and have some special promotions for you!-The first ... Read more

New Look Website!

As part of our Birthday celebrations we've had a bit of a facelift over on the Craft Stamper website.As well as a pretty new colour scheme and an easier to use layout, we've added a couple new features too.First of all there is a brand new Gallery where you can upload your fabulous stamped creations to share with other Craft Stamper readers. We'd love to see what you made that's been inspired by ... Read more

CS celebrates 10 years!

Our June 2010 issue marks ten years of Craft Stamper magazine, and to celebrate we have a BUMPER ISSUE with eight extra pages of loveliness for you to enjoy. As well as extra pages we’ve also got a special birthday competition with ten fabulous prizes up for grabs, and a little retrospective of ten years of favourite articles from readers and contributors.But that’s not all! Our website is having... Read more

Favourites?

I was chatting with CS regular Helen Chilton the other day and funnily enough we got onto the topic of stamping (can't imagine how that happened LOL). We got onto inkpads and starting to chat about our most used and loved inks, and Helen suggested this topic could make a fun blog post.If you set aside situations where you have to use a specific ink for a specific technique or surface, I think ... Read more

Annette again

You may remember Annette Goatley's Reader Submission in the March issue? It was a fabulous pair of ATCs?Well, Annette has been in touch with me again this week as she has made the most gorgeous project inspired by Helen Chilton's masterclass from the latest issue. Isn't it lush?I've just shown you the front here - pop over to Annette's brand new blog for more images of the inside and back. Thank ... Read more

Talented readers!

I hope you enjoyed Liesbeth Fidder's tutorial in our latest issue? Well reader Janet certainly did! She's created a lovely card using the techniques in the magazine which you can see on her blog here.Thank you for getting in touch to share your project Janet!Katy x... Read more

New issue out Friday 2nd April

Yep, it's that time again! The next issue of Craft Stamper - May issue - is out on sale this week.Lots of lovely projects this month to inspire you. We have a gorgeous background tutorial from our new face Liesbeth who I introduced to you yesterday; we have some clever easel cards made from Nestabilities dies; Stamping for Scrapbookers shows you how to make a texture paste frame... and lots more ... Read more