Wednesday 14 November 2012

Lino Love

Fave things to draw at the mo are feathers and geometric pattern. This is my first drawing of the two together. It's a work in progress. More to follow as I've just taken delivery of a lino print kit (excited but nervous!) Thinking my designs might be a little too detailed. 

Surface Pattern

I would really like to know more about silk screen printing and this design i did quite quickly. It's not great but I could see this on wallpaper or bedding. Might look into doing a course.

Vintage Illustrations





My latest project are these little beauties. Loving the current trend of vintage animal illustrations. I bought some cheap deep box frames and painted them. Found a selection of royalty free illustrations and mounted them onto pages of text from an old book and this is the result. I think they work quite well?

3 Little Birds

A fan of street art and especially stickers. Shoreditch is practically held together by sticker art! Thought I'd give it a go and did mine on a 'signed for' sticker courtesy of Royal Mail. Once I'd completed my little family of birds though, I didn't want to stick it anywhere. Struggling with this concept a bit.

Two Sugar's Please


 I did these and forgot about them. Might try and do them on nicer china. Maybe a cup and saucer. Just simple line drawings of botanical tea/coffee/sugar plants. I used cheap white plates and a Pebeo Porcelain marker. Which you can fire in the oven and they become dishwasher proof. I've found the pens to be a bit unreliable. One minute the ink flows well and the next it's faint. Perhaps it's my technique?! I've read that you can use Sharpie marker pens and fire them. Not sure how well this would work though. Apologies for poor picture quality.

Floral Bouquet

I did this a while ago and I just love it! The tower block and floral bouquet. A winning combo!

Time for Tea


It's been a while since I last updated. A busy summer has meant not a lot of creative output. I'd seen a photo of lots of tea pots on shelves and thought I'd quite like to draw a few of them. I took inspiration from the shapes but added my own designs. For shading I've been using a combination of cross hatching and dots (I'm sure there is a technical word for this!)

Thursday 3 May 2012

More for the jubilee...

One for the boys, as requested by my 7yr old.  Although, I'm sure there will be a few girls that are only to happy to don one of these on the big day. All three designs have now been printed onto a selection of different colour tees, by Mike from Native Promotions (highly recommend them). Just hoping it's not a wash out, with all of the rain recently, it is a worry! This design was the hardest for me. I had to re-draw it several times before I felt happy with it. The most difficult part being the crown. I could have added more detail to the skull but didn't want it to look too much like an Ed Hardy! Obviously the diamond for a nose represents diamond jubilee and the sceptre's for cross bones, combined with the crown, gives it a royal touch. My boys are happy with it too!                                     

Wednesday 11 April 2012

Another village...

This latest illustration was a commission by my good pal Sarah Young for her parents joint 65th birthday. Another of my made up streets, this time St.Osyth. From left to right: The Kings Arms pub, some of The Priory, the church entrance and the Old Mill (which is no longer there). The detail on The Priory took a while & was the hardest but I think they liked it....hope so!

Wednesday 28 March 2012

God Save The Queen...

A design for t-shirts. I really got into this illustration and was thinking more of the youth market. I've borrowed from street art with the arrows and crosses for eyes. The female is obviously not our lovely Liz. Didn't want to risk being done for treason by putting her in such a provocative pose! Thought this would appeal to both boys and girls. However, my 7'yr old son has said that he would not wear this because there is a heart and a girl on it! Because of this, I am now working on one for the boys!

A more traditional illustration. This is my design for tea towels and mugs. I'm having a small stall at our village Diamond Jubilee celebration. This took several attempts. I'm happy with this one and have combined some local reference points such as the lightship and a Thames barge with the younger looking Liz and the huge diamond! It's all done by hand and therefore not perfect but I like that and don't want the computer generated look. Hoping the locals will like it too!

Monday 19 March 2012

Vintage cake stands....




Finally got around to making these little lovelies. With the help of my husband, a v.powerful drill & a diamond drill bit, we got right to it. I've used a  selection of vintage china plates (mainly Meakin). The handles i bought from e-bay and sprayed them   these yummy pinks & green. Good enough to eat(off)! 

Thursday 8 March 2012

Up-cycled plates

My mum gave me a box of mix n match china and there was a lovely little t-set by Meakin.
The original design is called Royal Marigold. There were a few chips and hair line cracks so I have up-cycled the plates by putting my Tollesbury Loft design on them. They work quite well and have sold out & I've had an order for four more, which is great. Need to get to an auction and buy more china now! 

Friday 3 February 2012

Modelled by Morri

Here is the 1st tee modelled by my youngest. I used a simple iron on transfer and i'm really pleased with the result....so is Morri!

Thursday 26 January 2012

'Rock me baby'

My latest illustration is a brighter, perkier version of my 'Love Tollesbury' line up of key points in our village. I'm hoping to get this printed onto t-shirts, buckets and cups/plates for children. I've enjoyed injecting a bit of colour into this design. Now the boring bit is sourcing quality printers that will do small runs (at the right prices). 

Sunday 22 January 2012

Me old china...


I was collecting the odd bit of china, buying porcelain pens & other bits from craft websites and sketching some ideas. I'd been shown an article on the effortlessly cool Esther Coombs and was following her blog. She combines the delicate floral print of the vintage china with her brilliant architectural line drawings. The perfect juxtaposition. She was holding workshops at the fab little tearoom High Tea at Highgate in london. What could be better than a couple of hours spent scoffing yummy cake, downing coffee & drawing on a Sunday morning?! Add in to the mix that my husband had taken the kids to the park....I was in heaven. Here are a couple of plates I've done. Yes, you've probably guessed. They're down at The Loft.

Saturday 21 January 2012

My attempt at trompe l'oel

Not just for arts sake, this also works as an info sign for tide times (essential if you have your car parked down at the water!) and the way to the loo at The Loft

'Love Tollesbury'

My 'Love Tollesbury' collection is available at The Loft. My dear friends Shella & Emma have worked their little socks off and have opened a vintage tea room in a listed sail loft. Check out their blog tbythesea@blogspot.com
All homemade and locally sourced produce. They do the best alternative cake selection I've come across.
I have put my illustrations on just about everything! From bags, teapots & cups to tea towels and bookmarks. It seems to be doing well and I'm hoping to develop this and go to neighbouring villages to do the same.

A good place to start....


I have always enjoyed illustration. When I was younger I would constantly draw ballerinas & horses. Even at uni when studying fashion, the design process was my strongest and most enjoyable part. 
I love and am totally in awe of fashion illustrator Julie Verhoeven. Also, I'm a huge fan of Charlotte Mann who does amazing, densely scaled 1:1 drawings, using black marker pens. I'm mostly into line drawing and seriously rate Maija Louekari as well.
Working on and trying to develop my style for the last year, I kind of stumbled on an idea. I was drawing buildings and boats in my local area. Bit boring yeah? But then I thought if I took interesting and key buildings, merge them together on one street. Add some contemporary flowers/seed heads I might have something.