Scrapbooking Styles Defined

Defintions:

**BOHEMIAN aka BOHO **

Think ethnic. Think organic — earthy colors or fabrics. Think relaxed. Think vintage. Attitude and style that describes a free-spirited, independent frame of mind. Think Layers (lots of them) and accessories (natural) wovens and beads. (http://jewelry.about.com/od/antiquejewe … o_chic.htm)

Bohemian is a style. It’s a look. Swirls, medallions and silhouettes, layered flowers and tattoo-style images like wings, birds and crowns are all part of this trend. You’ll also find distressing techniques like inking and sanding. The look is similar to the vintage or shabby chic looks you’ve seen, but edgier and more vibrant. (www.scrapbooking101.net)

**GRUNGE**

extremely worn, torn, ripped, irregular, odd, messy, decayed, rusted, aged, full of texture, scratched, sanded, wrinkled, dirty although not required (vivayne)

grunge style: rather crude, radical and provoking.dirty look with irregular, nasty, sometimes even ugly and crooked visual elements, Stretched, torn, well-worn (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/01 … eb-design/)

**SHABBY CHIC**

Shabby Chic style is characterized by such colors as pastel pinks, muted greens, and washed gray or neutral tones combined with dark contrasting colors. Think vintage, well-worn, peeling, and well-loved. Think comfort. Shabby chic is not intimidating – it is warm, cozy and inviting.

Shabby chic is an easy style to achieve because it can include anything you love, mixing colors, patterns and textures. It involves distressing papers and page elements to give a vintage, well-worn look to them. It works especially well with heritage photos, black-and-white photos and sepia photos. (http://www.scrapvillage.com/shabbychic.htm)

Shabby chic – Mix a little bit of romance with some whimsy and modern elements and you’ve got shabby chic design. Shabby chic style focuses on old patterns used in new ways. You’ll use basic shapes like circles and squares in new and interesting ways. Distressing is your friend but you pair your distressed elements with bold color choices. (http://searchwarp.com/swa400890.htm)

**TRADITIONAL**

Traditional scrapbook pages are linear and orderly. If you like this style, you prefer to keep your pictures at their full size, or maybe with the corners rounded. Simple mats and a minimum of embellishments are hallmarks of these styles. Traditional layouts can be appropriate for heritage albums or preserving official documents. Your layouts are always clean and simple; no frills, swirls or multi-layer effects for you! Your color choices are usually from the neutral palate.  (http://searchwarp.com/swa400890.htm)

**MODERN**

You want to stay on top of the hottest trends and the newest techniques. You use clean lines, like with a traditional style but your color choices are more bold and varied. Look to fashion magazines for the latest color trends and see if you can match them with cardstock while you wait for scrapbook pattern designers to catch up! Metal, blocks and stripes are all modern and up to date embellishment choices.  (http://searchwarp.com/swa400890.htm)

**ROMANTIC & ELEGANT**

Your style is full of soft ribbon, flower embellishments and other romantic touches. The more soft edges and layers that you can add to a layout – the better! Although romantic color choices can run the gamut from soft pink to deep burgundy, your selections seem to be feminine and fun. Distressing is your favorite technique and if you can find ways to work lace into a layout, you’ll use it. You’ll normally use scripted fonts and antique metal accents to complete your romantic looks.  (http://searchwarp.com/swa400890.htm)

**WHIMSICAL**

Playful, fun and eclectic are all terms to sum up this style. Although it’s often associated with child themed pages, you can use a whimsical style on any type of page you wish. People who love this style like to use a lot of different types of media. Bold color choices, flourishes, dots and checks are all whimsical design elements.  (http://searchwarp.com/swa400890.htm)

**FREESTYLE**
Freestyle was promoted as a style to allow scrappers more freedom, to “let it all hang out” or to “scrap out of the box” is all about experimentation, thinking out of that box of more accepted design principles, and breaking rules that normally sit in and define our own scrapping lives. As freestylers, we somehow allow ourselves less inhibitions, less rules in formations, and this opens up new storylines and explorations of, in particular, our own inner thinkings. Quite often you will see the freestyle “style” being used when we scrap about ourselves. Freedom in ideas, freedom in design, freedom in capturing journaling that is sometimes very gut-wrenchingly raw. A Dash of Chaos – throw out the templates and sketches, don’t worry about lining things up, and let things fall where they may.

When One Word Says it All – use one big word on the layout
The Artist’s Canvas – play with paint and colors on your pages
Oodles of Doodles – use hand-drawn doodles
Random Acts of Type – mix up those fonts (in ransom style)

Art journaling (draw, paint, play with media), collage or montage (let things fall, don’t use templates), magazine-style and advertisement inspiration (borrow inspiration from all around you) all of the above from (http://digiscrapzine.com/content/view/17/27/)