I have been seeing all the layered art pieces lately and have been just loving them!

So I finally decided to try to do my own when my wife wanted ideas for gifts for our kids teachers (it has become a tradition for us).

I decided it wanted to try to replicate a classroom in an apple. Not realizing how lofty a challenge this would be… but I came up with a design I liked. If I were to do this again, I would add more color (for the tables and chairs), but I was in crunch-time to get these done before the last day of school!

I personalized the inside with the teachers name, and a phrase on the back.

I thought, “why should just the inside be layered?” So I layered the stem and leaf on the outside also.

It was seven layers in total, and I just barely got it all to fit on one sheet!

[Edit: Added a colored version.]

I colored a few of the layers to see how it would look. I think I just prefer the natural wood look (but maybe my colors are too bold).

This view seems to highlight the optical illusion also.