Easel cards are an old favourite of mine, and were actually the first kind of card I experimented with when I wanted to advance my cardmaking about eight years ago. The basic easel card is super simple, just score the front of your card in half to create the base and decorate however you like. You can mix this up by using a diagonal score line to give you a twisted easel card, and even adapt this into a double twisted easel too. But for those of you who want to take it even further, you can bring your dies into the mix to create shaped easel cards and intricate easel cards too.

Easel cards make great mantelpiece pleasers, and are a nice sturdy card that won’t fly off when someone rushes past! They easily fold flat to go in an envelope, but are super simple for the recipient to prop up and display. I have laid out this Masterclass to start with the simplest kind of easel card, and gradually get more advanced, I have used some gorgeous Spellbinders dies to decorate all the cards, but for the first three cards, you certainly don’t need to own a die-cutting machine.

So next time you’re making a card for someone special, and want to do something a bit different, why not pick one of these ways to create your basic easel card base and go from there. Who knows, you might discover your new favourite card style!

1

Place the top cutting edge of the die over the hinge of the card blank as shown

2

Open out the card blank and line the top cutting plate up with the fold of your card, then run through the die-cutting machine

3

This will cut the detail into the card front – snip off the excess using scissors as shown

4

Close the card blank and use a paper trimmer to trim the back edges of the card to be just wider than the intricate front

5

Open the card blank and place it on a scoreboard, then score the front intricate section roughly in half and fold

6

This article is tagged as:

Die-cutting Easel cards Layered step-by-step skillbuilder Christine Smith hearts Die-cutting Essentials twisted easel card DCE44 double twisted easel card papercraft how-to