House of Alice Theatre

Alice in Wonderland intrigues us all, doesn't it? We love the curious little girl that dives headfirst into a strange rabbit hole, looking for the next adventure. We love the absurd language and strange characters and the nonsensity (is that a word?) that has us laughing and at times guessing at what silliness is going on.  I thought of Alice when I learned Alpha Stamps had these spectacular new shadowbox theatres and decided to put the book on stage, so to speak.

The shadowbox theatre is 1" wide, making it the perfect depth for some interchangeable chipboard scenes. The scenes are built on panels that look like this:

Thick chipboard panels

Thick chipboard panels for backgrounds

The length along the top edge of each panel is 5 1/2", the length along the bottom of the panel is 5 1/4", and the height from top to bottom is 4 5/8". The width of the panel legs are about 1/4". After cutting out a bunch of these from chipboard, I painted them with red, black, and pale grey acrylic paint. Then the fun began! Several Alice images, selected from this massive compilation, were cut out and glued on the panels, creating entertaining scenes.

Here you can see, just barely, three panels that make up the "I'm Late" scene: the dotted background panel, the suspended clocks panel, and the I'm Late panel. The clocks came from the Clock Faces collage sheet and were suspended from the center chipboard panel with invisible thread. I glued two clock faces together, sandwiching the thread in between. The "I'm Late" banner hangs from black satin ribbon on the front panel.

I love this image of a squashed Alice. I've had an old 1978 Castle Books publication of Alice in Wonderland for an eternity and this illustration fit exactly right in the theatre. The window came from the More Old Windows and Doors collage sheet.

Can't have Alice without a tea party! This particular collage sheet (I used a resized digital download) is a favourite because you can play with the characters. The Hatter, dormouse, and rabbit are removable which doubles the fun.

"Off With Her Head" includes three separate panels and uses adhesive pop dots to achieve the 3D effect of the playing cards.

Here's some pics of the individual panels I created for House of Alice. The background panels are double-sided, so I ended up making 12 pieces.

The End.

 The list of supplies can be found HERE. Happy New Year!