My mother’s side of the family hails from Okinawa, Japan. Whereas I’ve incorporated a few Asian touches into generic scrapbook pages, I have yet to design multiple layouts or a mini album dedicated solely to my Japanese heritage. However, after recently viewing a vacation scrapbook made by a friend, who just completed a tour of Japan, I’m in the planning stages of creating a book dedicated to the “Land of the Rising Sun.”
Fortunately, Japan is a popular country, so finding the materials needed to create stunning scenes has not been hard. I’ve collected a litany of Japanese-inspired embellishments and paper with the following designs:
*Cherry blossoms
*Japanese characters
*Sushi
*Kimonos
*Bonsai plants
*Cranes
*Geisha girls
*Silk
I had a harder time finding an actual book that reflected an Asian theme. Fortunately, my mom offered me a large piece of leftover silk she had, which could easily pass as kimono fabric. I plan to use it to cover an inexpensive memory book. One of the ladies in my scrapbook group suggested that I add some Japanese-themed clip art to the outside of my album. Another option is to find a kanji symbol on the Internet, enlarge it, print it and decoupage it to the cover of the book. That same idea could be used if you are a collage fan. Simply, find dozens of Japanese-themed clip art and other photos and create a collage using the images to completely cover the front of your scrapbook.
In regards to embellishments I have been folding origami creations since I was in first grade, so adding a few paper animals, flowers and other objects to my layouts will be no problem. I am also toying with the idea of using textured mulberry paper instead of traditional scrapbook paper to add to the overall theme of the book. In addition, I could create a 12×12 scrapbook page by gluing smaller origami squares together to further enhance the Japanese-inspired style of my layouts.
What other suggestions do you have to enhance my Japanese-themed scrapbook?
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