Review: Stencil 101

by Sister-Diane on November 13, 2008

in Craft Books, Fabric Crafts, Paper Crafts

What a dang fine innovation – craft book as craft tool!

Stencil 101 is not only a how-to book on stenciling, it’s a book of cool, precut stencils. Ed Roth is something of a stencil genius – you may have seen his work on Martha.

The 25 designs are super-great. You can see several on the book cover, and more on the back, which you can see at Amazon. They’re all made from heavy laminated paper, so they can be cleaned and reused.


(And because Chronicle’s good like that, the stencil pages are all perforated, and there’s a storage pocket to keep them in.) This is probably a good time to mention that all these stencil designs are copyrighted for personal use only – no resales.

Totally love this owl. And by the way, Ed has even more stencils and stencil sets available at his website (scroll down on that link).

In addition to all the stencils, there’s a great how-to section that should get even the most novice stenciler up and running.

And then, there’s a series of projects that explain how to apply stencils to several different surfaces: wood, t-shirts, shoes, greeting cards, lampshades, cakes.

Freakin’ awesome. My only complaint being that this is exactly the wrong time of year for me to get all obsessed with a new craft. Hmmm . . . who on my list needs a monkey-emblazoned tee?

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  • I think the proper question is "Who on your list DOESN'T need a monkey-emblazoned tee"... or owl, or high heel. It seems like a great way to customize basic gifts -I mean, what can't you stencil? You may start with just some bland bag, but throw their favorite something on there and suddenly you've got a thoughtful and personal gift.

    This gives me many ideas. Ah, for a budget that allowed random books of awesome.
  • I suddenly want to put a high heeled shoe on a cake.

    I do not need another book. Why'd you have to review such a dope looking one? Maybe i'll put it on my wish list.
  • WOW! Thanks for the spectacular review! Great photos too! If you are in the Brooklyn vicinity, Saturday December 6th from 4-6pm is our initial book launch party at Powerhouse Arena. Stop by and stencil a card or a tote bag while eating Stencil1 chocolates from ChoclateBarNYC! Thanks again! Ed
  • I have always wanted a monkey on my tee.
    Isn't Chronicle wonderful? Thank you for the link to the video, because somehow I missed this guy!
    This looks like a great book. It's going on my wish list!
  • gl.
    are you kidding? the holidays are the perfect time to become obsessed w/ them. won't somebody please think of the cakes?
  • We really need that book--we were so excited about it when we saw it in the Chronicle catalog. Although it looks like the stencils may be too thick for our purposes (we screen print with stencils a lot). Thanks for the review, Diane!
    ~Sarah & Josh
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