An introduction to quilling

Ok, so you want to quill, huh?

I don't blame you! As a hobby, it's cheap, easy and once you get the hang of it, you can make some impressive looking pieces! Well, you're going to need a few things to start off with:

Tools

• Fingers. Very useful items for this craft, although if you want to show off and you're very agile, toes would do at a push.
• Strips of paper of varying widths. The standard width in the UK is 3mm (one eighth of an inch in the USA / some other countries) for most stuff, 1.5mm for fine narrow work, and 6mm, 9mm, or even 12mm for folded roses and fringed flowers.
• PVA glue. Only the child friendly stuff for you lot, just to be safe. It's best to decant it into a fine nozzle glue dispenser, such as the Art Institute or other brands.
• Nails. Or the back of a knife. Or anything you can use to scrape paper to start it curling.
• Tweezers! Not the eyebrow ones (although they'll do at a pinch), really you need ones that come to a narrow point, as fine as possible. I got fancy-schmancy medical tweezers, but any fine point tweezers without gripping ridges (that would crumple the paper) will do.
• Some small, sharp scissors. Cuticle scissors are good, they're very helpful for trimming strip ends, fringing flowers etc.
• Some sort of flat surface to work on. Depending on whether you want to copy exactly a diagram, or design freehand (easier and less terrifying than it sounds, honest!) you'll need either a cork or porous board (anything that you can stick pins into that'll stay in place) and some greaseproof/tracing paper. The board lets you stick pins in to hold the quilled bits in place as they're gluing to each other, and the greaseproof paper is for putting a pattern beneath that you then lay out on top of the paper to make the shapes to match it. This type of board is best of you're copying a design.
• A flat surface, preferably plastic/smooth. I make my stuff freehand, and glue it together on a flat surface. Usually a bit of extra glue seeps out from the join between the pieces and ends up on the back, so I need a smooth plastic surface to be sure I’ll be able to detach it when the glue’s dried! Mainly, I use a plastic tray – now heavily glue covered!

Optional bit and bobs:

• A quilling tool. But I don’t recommend it you know! Using one of these do-hickeys means that the centres or your rolls are gonna be big and bulky, rather than neat and inconspicuous. It’s worth the effort (and occasional swear words) of learning to roll without them.
• A paper shredder. Handy if you want to make your own unusual paper strips. Make sure it tells you on the box the width of the strips though: you want 3mm. Also, paper can slant as it’s going in, so you get short diagonal strips instead of long straight ones.They can also fray the edges of the paper, leaving them looking 'furry'.
• A cocktail stick. For neat people (not me!). You can use this to transfer glue to the ends of your strips once rolled, but that’s why I like fine nozzle glue dispensers - you can wipe the strip directly against the glue nozzle!

Right, got that all together? Are we all sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.