2010 Gothic Arch Challenge - Wrap Up Part 2.

I really can't believe it's June already! 2011 is half finished, and I'm only now announcing the winners of the Inkurable Stampers 2010 Gothic Arch challenge! This weekend is the first in EONS where I have had a spare moment to sit down and finally sort through all the gorgeous challenge entries and pick the winners. Everyone did such an amazing job, I needed to take the time to make sure I looked at every single arch before making my decisions. I also needed to double check the names of everyone who completed all 24 arches to make sure when I picked a random winner, all those that were eligible were in the "hat".

It has been a very long process, and it was not an easy job deciding which ones I liked the best! But I can now finally say that it is time to announce the winners!

Firstly - a few stats for you all:

* There were 24 different Gothic Arch challenge themes.
* 33 different people gave at least one of the challenges a go.
* Only 12 people finished all 24 arches by the deadline of 31st December 2010.
* Of those 12, 6 were from Australia and 6 were international.
* There are 424 amazingly inspiring Gothic Arches in our Flickr Gallery. Please pop over and have a look - it is so inspiring!

Thank you to everyone who played along with the Inkurable Stampers 2010 Gothic Arch Challenge - whether you made one arch or all 24, you contributed to an amazing collection of artwork, and we loved seeing everything that was created.

A very special thank you goes out to Fiona Shultz - without whom I wouldn't have been able to continue the challenge! Fiona created so many gorgeous challenge samples for you all, and I'm sure you join me in saying thank you for such inspiring work! You truly did an awesome job Fiona! Take a look at all of Fiona's awesome arches in this slideshow:



A big thank you also goes out to our guest artists for the challenge:

* Sarah Fawcett - Steampunk Arch.
* Jill Geraghty-Groves - Paint and Fabric Arches.
* Vicky Fernando - Spooky Arch.
* Robyn Wood - Planes, Train, and Automobiles Arch.
* Jan Smith - Mythical Creatures arch.

Thank you so much for sharing your talent with us all!

And last but most certainly not least, a HUGE thank you goes out to our fabulous friends at Crafty Individuals who have provided the awesome prizes for the challenge winners - you guys ROCK! To refresh your memory, see the prizes here.

Ok ok ok ok ok - I know you're thinking "just shut up and announce the winners already!" LOL! So here goes!

Congratulations to the following lucky ladies:

RANDOM WINNER (randomly picked from all those who completed all 24 arches by the due date):

KAREN_STAMPS (Karen Daley from Canada)!!! Congratulations Karen! Your gorgeous new stamps will be on their way to you shortly! Here are Karen's set of arches:

MY FAVOURITE SET OF ARCHES:

Boy oh boy - I didn't realise just how hard it would be to pick the winner for this category! Everyone did such an amazing job - and there were arches in everyone's sets that took my breath away. It was reeeeeeeeeeally really close in the end, however, the person who's arches made me gasp the most was......

SMIFFEROO (JAN SMITH)!! Congratulations Jan! Such an awesome collection of arches to be proud of!

Check them out here:

MY FAVOURITE SINGLE ARCH:

Again - this was painfully hard to choose, there were so many that I loved! However one particular arch just jumped right out at me from the moment I saw it, and I still love it today as much as I did back then. Congratulations goes to JULIE HAELEMEERSCH (ARTYVENTURE) who created this amaaaaaazing arch:

Absolutely gobsmacking! I just love the colours, the imagery, and the products and techniques used! Well done Julie!

Congratulations to all three ladies! Enjoy your prizes!

Now, it would be totally remiss of me not to showcase a bunch of my other favourite arches - so stay tuned to the blog because sometime during the week I will share the 2010 Gothic Arch Challenge Wrap up Part 3 - honourable mentions!

Stay inky!

~Sarah~