Eye-Catching Paper Cut Strawberry Design

This is a great introdution to papercutting because it's an easy and simple design, and using the 2 contrasting colours of paper creates an effective and eye-catching piece of art.

I made my paper cut strawberry into a greetings card topper, but you could use it for gift tags or enlarge it to make some DIY wall art.

You will need:

- A piece of white paper; for the template.

- Black and red paper. You can use different colours if you prefer. Thick paper is best.

- Piece of card or a photo frame (optional); If you want to make art, you'll want a photo frame to display your design. If you want to make a greetings card, you'll need a piece of card.

- Craft knife and either a cutting mat or a scrap piece of thick cardboard to protect your work surface.

- Pencil/pen

- Foam tape; You can instead layer the papers directly on top of each other with double-sided tape, but foam tape gives a great 'depth' to your project.

- Scissors

* You're using a knife to cut, so pease be careful! Make sure you drag the craft knife along the paper towards you and not at an awkward angle.

Step 1: Draw Your Design

This strawberry design I just did freehand because it's such a simple shape. If you want to do a different shape to a strawberry, search for what you want to draw in Google Images for inspiration. Leaves and fruits are good choices.

You don't want to have a complete outline of the shape, because this will separate the strawberry from the rest of the paper.

Instead, split the outline up into different sections to give the suggestion of the shape without having a full outline. The main outline of the strawberry is split into two short lines.

The little leaves will be cut along one side of the oval shape only (and then later folded upwards), so you only need to draw half an oval for these.

Small dots on the surface of the strawberry will be cut out completely.

Step 2: Start Cutting

Put your white paper template on top of your black paper. You can add a little bit of masking tape (on part of the paper you won't be using) or paperclips to keep your paper together, but I just held mine still with my hand.

Put these papers on a cutting mat or some thick scrap cardboard and use your craft knife to cut your design out. Remember you need to go through both the white paper and the black paper, but you shouldn't have to push your knife down very hard.

I cut the main outline out first, then the stalk outline, then the half-oval lines of the leaves, and then the 'seeds'.

Step 3: Finish Cutting

Once you've gone over the cut-lines with your knife, you'll need to score fold lines on the leaves.

To do this, it's best to remove the white paper template first.

Then take your craft knife and lightly score a straight line along the centre of each leaf, going from one end of each cut half-oval to the other. This will allow you to fold the leaves along the centre more easily.

Scoring along the side of a steel ruler will help you get a straight line more easily.

Step 4: Fold the Leaves

Remove all of the cut-out pieces of the black paper, and then carefully fold the leaves upwards along the lines you have just scored.

Put your red paper underneath to see that it looks how you want.

Step 5: Add the Foam Tape

I cut the black paper and red paper into identical square shapes.

I added small pieces of foam tape in each corner on the reverse of the black square, peeled the backing off the tape and then stuck it onto the red paper square.

I did the same for the red paper square and stuck it onto a folded piece of card. One greetings card finished!