Colours from the season - Ginkgo Biloba green

It's been a while!

When I was teaching a short course in textile design at West Dean College last week, one of the students very kindly brought me in a small branch from her Ginkgo Biloba tree because I'd mentioned that I had always wanted to draw it. So there was nothing to be done but make time this weekend to draw a few leaves and document their beautiful colours for a bit of brain therapy...

Colours from the top: Leaf green; leaf stalk yellow; fruit green; young fruit blue/green; branch brown.

Many thanks to Sally

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook

Screen Printing in the studio Fern collection

Drawing isn't work for me, even though it is of course an important part of my work, it's also how I unwind and relax. Rather than pick up a book in the evening or watch TV, over the past ten years years often I've preferred to draw. It gives me a huge input of inspiration, as well as original imagery to use in my designs...

...or that's until this year, when my days have been so full on and labour intensive I haven't had any spare energy or even inclination, and drawing in the evening has been squeezed out! (I have at times wondered if I will ever draw again, but let's not head off down that train of thought!).

It's not all doom and gloom however as some of those sparks of an idea I've had whilst drawing have filtered into new textile designs. In particular a new Fern panel, as well as Fern cushions and napkins have hit the print table. They were a great success when I exhibited them last week at 'Handmade at Kew' and I thought I'd share some images here...(as I'm not drawing!)

Super size ferns drying on the print table..

With Luna! (she was not overly keen to pose, but she does give a sense of scale!).
Ivy fabric in the background...

With a fellow panel...

Two by two napkins drying on the rack...

Folded Fern napkins with Beech and a few Rabbits, not unlike the woods here in North Devon...

All now available from my website shop! 

I've just joined the 111 club set up by Patricia Van den Akker of the Design Trust. In 2017, I intend to take time, along with one hundred and ten other creatives (internationally), to properly reflect on and make informed choices about running my business in 2017! and thereby (hopefully) make more time for the things that matter most.

If it's of interest to you there may be a few places left  - find out more about it here ...

Colour from the season - Hard Fern green

As a self-employed designer/maker,  I'm pretty disciplined on the whole. I rise early, walk Luna and start work by 9am. I usually work until 6pm, but sometimes later. I also often work on Saturday and if I'm running a screen-printing or Photoshop workshop, I work all weekend. The plus side is of course that I love my work and as long as I don't beat myself up for not getting something done, in the main, no-one else does either.

These attractive little ferns, which grow everywhere here in North Devon are called Hard Ferns or Blechnum spicant (slightly strange name so called because of their leathery form (?)). I've made time to sketch a few of them, to feature in a new wall panel along with a couple of other ferns, which I hope to put on screen and print at a super-sized scale next week.

I generally design what I would love to live with myself. As Oscar Wilde so aptly said -

"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken"...

In case you wonder what soft ferns look like? I'm attaching a photo of a Soft Shield Fern (Polystichum setiferum) below...

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the Season - Monterey Pine Needle green

Inevitably seasons pass and everything gets a little older. Even the Monterey Pine in the Heddon Valley was looking the worse for wear when I visited it last week after weeks of wind and rain. It seemed to be leaning over even more than usual. I went after the storms especially to gather a few of its needles for a new design I'm working on. Even after the tail end of Storm Frank (?!) I had to scramble around the banks to find a few small branches as it doesn't give up its cones, or it would seem, its needles very readily.

Challenging on the eyes to distinguish between the background and foreground needles, I had to really concentrate, not unlike drawing the Monterey Cone! (here).

Rich earthy colours of the needles...

A sight for sore eyes on a grey January day. The Hunter's Inn with Monterey Pine (behind the right chimney).

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the season - Hydrangea Green

In the limelight, refreshing late Summer colours of Hydrangea paniculata.

Over the bank holiday weekend I sketched one flower head (it took ages, all those little flowers!), then decided to sketch another flower (with more care) which turned out almost exactly the same! Very enjoyable anyway (and alive to boot)...

Luna preferred the Purple Elder...

Uplifting Summer screen-printing listening has been from Madisen Ward and the Mama Bear - 'Silent Movies' from their fab debut album 'Skeleton Crew'...

Colour from the Season - Stinging Nettle Green

Four weeks ago I began a course in Mindfulness. One thing we've been encouraged to do is study everything more intensely - expanding what is often a very ordinary experience into something extraordinary. This sense, the visual, is easy for me, not only is this something I do without effort all the time, but something I've spent much of my life striving to be good at.  This is described perfectly by John Hopper when coincidently last week he wrote about Mindfulness, Creativity and Observation on 'The Textile Blog' (here).

I was reminded how beneficial it is to draw and how not drawing these past few months has been negatively affecting me, as though some part of me were missing - like losing touch with an old friend.

The (vicious) dewy hairs of these Stinging Nettles (Urtica dioica) in the early morning were the palest misty purple, once picked they dramatically wilted and I thought that was the end of them. They revived however, now more an angry shade of red and my hands are still smarting...

"Tender handed stroke a nettle,
And it stings you for your pains:
Grasp it like a man of mettle,
And it soft as silk remains"

Aaron Hill, 1753 (British dramatist and poet)

(Try this if you like but don't say I didn't warn you!)

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the season - Bramble leaf green

There are times when you have to put things that upset you out of your mind and look on the bright side. (Have I said that already? - well I'm working hard at it).

This was the most positive green I could find in the woodland! Moreover, it was the brightest green stalk on the entire bush. Drawn with dip pen and as a radical departure from the usual black, Dr. Ph Martin's Bombay Grass green ink mixed with a dash of Sepia.

It happened to have a dead leaf impaled onto it's stem, so I noted these browns alongside.

Nice thorns..!

Scaling up one of my favourite notebook drawings in the studio today..!

Listening to this..!

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the Season - unknown shrub green

As this was the second time I had purloined a cutting of this beautiful shrub (from a certain car park in Exeter), it would have felt criminal not to post it's colours here, just because I didn't know its name!

Perhaps it's fitting on the eve of a new year to post the colours and form of a plant I don't recognise and haven't been able to identify - though I'd love to find out if someone knows?

So here's to unknown horizons...
...and nature's evocative colours!

UPDATE 2/1/14 - Many thanks to Lesley, Joy and Mary for getting in touch while I was away for New Year to tell me that it's a Callistemon - more commonly known as Bottlebrush. See it in flower here and you can understand why!

The ink drawings. I drew each branch separately in my A3 'Moleskine' sketchbook, then scanned and pieced the branches back together digitally.

Photo detail for ID purposes...

...and VERY Happy New Year!

(drawn listening to the album 'Reflektor' by Arcade Fire)

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the Season - Yew Green

My studio is sited on the North wall of St. Mary Magdalene Churchyard and (as in so many Churchyards) there are Yew trees a stones throw from my studio. I've been thinking of documenting their quite unusual colours for a couple of years but a little put off by the fact that they are so poisonous!

The attractive glossy pink "berries" (aka modified female cones), would not look out of place in a packet of Dolly mixture and might be edible, but for the fact that the single seed within is as toxic as you can imagine! The spiky deep green foliage reaching up to the heavens is the most poisonous part of all.

I've brought together (wearing surgical gloves!) the colours of the berry, foliage and branch which are unusual and exceptional together as you can see here for yourself...

Yew colours - St. Mary Magdalene.

I'd rather like to live in a tree house, but perhaps not in this Yew in La Haye-de-Routot ..!

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the season - Pine needle green

It's that time of year when the weather turns chilly and the concrete floor of my studio acts like a giant refrigerator, so for anyone else suffering from the cold, blocked up nose, or stuffy head, I thought it was timely to bring a few freshly cut Pine branches and their bang on trend colours to the notebook...

Just in case you are still feeling cold (or lonesome) this video of Laurel and Hardy singing 'Trail of the Lonesome Pine' works for me..!




...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the season - Duck Egg green

Spring arrived yesterday – only for the day, but what a day!

Our neighbour has (what I think are) Black Indian Runner Ducks and this morning she gave us some eggs. Wow! Duck Egg blue, or green as it turned out because the egg has more yellow than blue as well as a percentage of black.

I thought it would be a simple notebook page, one egg and one colour, but no, an egg is not an easy thing to draw..!

Distracted lately because at last I've started some new designs for fabric, in their infancy, they've been buzzing around in my head for a few months. Inspired by the Ivy, Roses, the block repeat post...

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the Season - Bamboo Green

This Bamboo (Phyllostachys Nigra) has helped to brighten my Winter! It's simply been the most lively green outside my back door on even the darkest of days. I was adding colour to a drawing of it yesterday and decided it deserved a mention.

When I first tried to draw bamboo, I discovered that it dies quickly when you cut it. I cut a full stem and placed in water to draw, but within a few hours the leaves had rolled in on themselves - hopeless! The only thing to do was to draw it outdoors. So one Spring day, a few years ago, I sat on a low seat in the garden with a drawing board on my lap, a long roll of cartridge paper and starting at the base of the stem, I drew a full stem - not in pencil but directly in ink. I waited for the ink to dry then rolled the paper up, continuing to draw and roll until I reached the top. The following year (!) I decided that this one stem was a bit lonely and so I drew another! The drawings are approximately life size and measure 2.6 metres and 2.4 metres.

I then scanned these images, re-drew them in (Adobe) Illustrator, laser etched the first of them into Cork and exhibited this at 100% Design in London in 2009. For some time I've been thinking of adding colour as I'd like to screen or possibly digitally print them onto fabric. So here as a result, are the fresh colours as I noted them yesterday...

The first ink sketch...

The second...

Laser etched into Cork...

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.

Colour from the season - Fern green

Sorry colour fans - just green, in fact two greens and two fairly nondescript greens at that. So if this doesn't interest you then no need to look any further at this post! If however, you might like to marvel at the elegant form of a Royal fern (as common as muck here in Devon), as well as the patience it's taken to draw, not once but many times over, then you might want to take a further peek!

I have ambitious plans for these drawings, so I've scanned all stages of their development, from pencil, to ink, to colour, but don't hold your breath, it may take some time...

au naturel...

...and just perfect for the next pattern post (mirrored block repeat)?

(Drawn listening to the excellent album 'Tramp' by Sharon Van Etten -  reflective video of the track Leonard here).

...from my seasonal colour sample notebook.