Beach Layout

I was the lucky winner of the March Vintage Journey challenge and I was invited to Guest Design.
The theme for this month's challenge, hosted by Astrid, is Embossing Pastes/Textures, a must have for Mixed Media work, and this is what I am showing today.

Hoping for warmer weather, I selected bright colours and let go the Vintage tones entirely, taking inspiration from beach colours for a holiday scrapbook page. The photo I have included is not actually the photo but a place holder I had great fun to design.

For the background I used sprays and Grunge paste with several stencils on my watercolour paper base.
As a feature I created a sandy beach on my "photo" and also in the top left corner with heavy gel medium, a touch of yellow acrylic paint and sand of course!

To make my fake photo I stamped the lady in Versafine on glossy paper (from the Take the plunge set by Rubber Dance) and coloured with Distress inks.

Finally I used some paste as a 3D glue to give my shells a more realistic shape.
To make them I first stamped them (all shells, starfish and seahorse are from the Rubber Dance Retro Beach set ), then fussy cut. I applied a bit of colour with Distress inks and shaped then with a ball tool, giving them a curve. The gel medium helps in supporting the curve as well as keeping the shells stuck!
I added a few sea creatures confetti (painted with gesso to dampen the garish colours), muslin, and micro beads.
Under this angle the sun catches the mica for maximum shine!

You can visit A Vintage Journey for more pictures.
Also entering the Our Creative Corner, Love to Create and That's Crafty challenges