Hobbies to try at uni: Scrapbooking

Sophia Lamberton 14 September 2022
Hobbies to try at uni: Scrapbooking

Scrapbooking is a cheap way to express your creativity and preserve memories. Here’s everything you need to know to get started.

Scrapbooking is a fantastic way to keep all your uni memories in one place. No more concert tickets, flyers, and wristbands lying around your bedroom floor. Don't worry if you're not very creative; we're going to show you that scrapbooking is easier than you think!

Before you start, you need to decide on a theme for your scrapbook. Choosing a theme will allow you to decide on the colour palette, as well as which photos and memorabilia you want to include. You could make a scrapbook about your time spent studying abroad, what you got up to over the summer, or the best nights out from the last academic year.

Once you've decided on a theme, gather anything you want to add to your scrapbook, photos etc, and store them in envelopes or folders until you're ready to assemble everything.

What you’ll need

Here’s a list of all the basics you'll need to start scrapbooking, and we've also included a few extras you can get from your local craft store or stationery shop.  

  • A soft-bound scrapbook album or a binder, ideally 12-inch-by-12-inch, so you can fit several photos on one page. If you want a smaller scrapbook that's easier to store, buy an 8.5'' x11" album.
  • Scrapbook pages
  • Printed photos
  • Pens, markers, or highlighters 
  • Scissors
  • Acid-free adhesives, will help to preserve your scrapbook for longer.
  • Double-sided tape or liquid glue
  • You might want to buy little extras like washi tape, decorated paper and ribbons.

 

Let's get creative!

 

Once you've decided on the theme of your scrapbook, you need to decide on the colour scheme. We recommend using three colours on a page: a main, secondary and an accent colour.

 

Before arranging your photos, draw a 3x3 grid on the scrapbook pages, then try arranging the photos on the intersecting lines. You could also try tilting the photos on some pages or using black and white photographs alongside colour photos to give your scrapbook a bit of variation. 

 

Pinterest can be a great source of creative inspiration, there’s plenty of great boards filled with scrapbook design ideas.

 

Once you've stuck down your photos and memorabilia, caption the photographs so it's easier to recall what was special about that memory when you look back in years to come.

Digital scrapbooking

There are so many benefits unique to digital scrapbooking. Firstly, it's much more sustainable than using paper. It's also a lot cheaper, and you can create as many scrapbooks as you want without worrying about storage or misplacing them. Plus, creating a digital scrapbook makes it really easy to share copies with your friends.

You don't really need a lot to get started, just a laptop or desktop computer and a few other things. You'll need some photos, ideally stored as PNG or JPG files, so you can easily share them. You can scan any printed photos you want to include in your digital scrapbook. 

You'll also need photo editing software; luckily, this doesn’t have to cost the Earth! Here are a few of our favourites: 

  • Adobe Photo Elements is really simple to use and allows you to edit photos quickly. There are so many templates to choose from, but you'll need to make a one-off purchase to access this software.
  • Bag yourself a seven-day free trial on Envato Elements, after that you'll pay a small monthly fee to access their services. Envato offers graphic templates, fonts and music tracks.
  • Canva is a really cool free website with lots of templates to choose from. If you want to, you can upgrade to the Pro version to access more template designs. You can also use scales on the website to see how big your photos are on the page. It’s also really handy for making professional posters for uni assignments.

Have you started any new hobbies since being at uni? Join our student panel and let us know. You’ll get 1000 reward points for signing up.

Sophia Lamberton 14 September 2022