Change of scenery

These are some photos from our weekend in London. It was a refreshing and inspiring change of scenery and chance to see some bits of London we'd never seen before. It was Martha's first trip to London and she seemed to like the excitement of it all and the London buses in particular!

Exploring Columbia Road flower market and the shops along Columbia Road on Sunday was a highlight for me. I was very excited to see the Word Maps given such prominence in Treacle (including the new London Map in the window) and there's many other great shops along there like Elphick and Keeping House. We squeezed in a morning coffee and almond croissant (my absolute favourite) at a Spanish café along there too.

We'd also managed to get pre-booked tickets for the Hockney exhibition at the Royal Academy (thanks go to my husbands brother and wife who we stayed with) and the exhibition didn't disappoint. We were particularly intrigued to see it as the East Yorkshire landscapes and villages he's based his work around and explored in the past 7 years are a stones-throw from us - i.e as close as 5 miles away - and the landscapes he paints are the ones so familiar to us.

A good (if tiring) weekend.

Craft Business Heroes

Last summer I was contacted by Alison McNicol author of several craft books and a craft entrepreneur herself. She wanted to interview me about my business; what I do and how I set it up with advice for others wanting to set up a craft/design/handmade business.

It sounded very interesting so I obliged by answering all the questions Alison sent. I found it quite an insightful experience as I actually got the chance to step back for a moment and realise what I've done and how I got here. I've been carried along by events and trade fairs and orders over the past few years I hadn't realised the momentum I'd achieved and certainly didn't realise that it could be helpful to others to hear how I set up, work and run the business day-to-day.

It's also really interesting to read how other people got to where they are today and their working practices and stories.

The resulting book 'Craft Business Heroes' is available from Amazon along with it's sister book

'The Craft Business Handbook'.

Jolly cold

Brrrr. It's a cold day. The first properly cold day we've had for a while. I love the sunny frosty days but the heating has had to be constantly in my studio so far today to keep me toasty while I'm sat at the computer doing a bit of designing.

The fantastic photos above are unfortunately not mine and are curtesy of a new-found blog 'Souvenirs' (via The Seventy Tree Feb links). Niina is in Finland and it looks even chillier over there at the moment - but very pretty. I love her photographs - the colours in them are amazing and she looks like she's rather fond of a coffee and sweet treat same as me!

Word Map of London

I took delivery of a very brand new exciting print today. Word Map of London - my latest collaboration with Snowhome was launched by Angus and the Snowhome team at Home show a couple of weeks ago. We had a little day-trip down to London to check out the show and to see the newly launched London map. It was really good to see it all finished, framed up and on display in all it's glory so to speak.

It's strange but as with the last map typological map I did with Snowhome once I've finished the many many hours hand drawing I tend to view and appreciate it from afar rather than getting 'up close' to it like I noticed others were doing (- so they could read the specific words). I worked so very near to it and intensely that - as with the the British Isles map I was again amazed that the overall affect when I stood back at the end was of a fully recognisable and definable shape of London. I can therefore appreciate it with a 'detachedness' that I wouldn't have expected from a piece I spent so many hours on.

Yet again Angus' meticulous research yielded some very amusing, interesting and diverse words and clichés which provided me with much hilarity when juxtaposing them with other words. I always had to be quite conscious of alternating the different hand drawn types I used and making sure they didn't run into each other and create unreadable consequences. I would certainly say I know my London boroughs and London history and geography much better now! As with last time it was an education as well as a commission!

So - some statistics for you for the creation of this epic London map:

It contains 339 sets of words (don't quote me on it - that's approximate by my counting).

It required 4 x size 01 paintbrushes (I couldn't use them once they had a hair out of place for the very fine small text!) and one pot of indian ink and a very very steady hand!

Finally - they're available from both my shop and Snowhome (also in their bricks and mortar shop on Gillygate in York - go and have a look if you're in York.)

I hope you like it!

And a happy new year!

Welcome back and a very happy 2012 to all!

I had a lovely break and feel refreshed and ready for action! Today was my first day back at my desk after 12 full days away from work. Apart from the usual festivities, eating too much, catching up with friends and family and watching some good films I didn't do a lot else. I had plans.... but relaxing came first and I think I mostly managed it for once.

I got some lovely Christmas presents - a few of which I thought I'd share. I have a very thoughtful family who know exactly what I like (and my sister reads my blog so she keeps a look out for what I've got my eye on!)

The charming little badges are by Lovely Pigeon, the wonderful Sea Regions map is by James Brown for Keep Calm Gallery and I've been poring over this book since I got it - Print and Pattern 2 from the writer of the blog Print & Pattern. It's provided me with some much needed colour and inspiration to get me ready to create some exciting new things for the year to come. I'm very excited - I've been having a good think about the direction I want to take things this year and changes are afoot!

Have a ............

That's me finished for this year. I'm having a little festive break and relaxing for the next week and a half after a very busy year. I'll be back in my studio on Wednesday 4th January so have a very very Merry Christmas and here's to an exciting 2012!

x

Christmas round-up

Here's a little festive glimpse of a few of my favourite Christmassy things.

The tree photos are of the newest additions to our Christmas tree. We don't have a very co-ordinated tree but instead have a very eclectic mixture of decorations which have caught my eye over time. I bought a few wooden stars from Posh Graffiti this year. Also - the best find was the vintage baubles which my mum had hidden away which belonged to my Grandma and Grandad and I think they're beautiful. They're so much daintier and prettier than all the naff stuff in the shops these days. Plus they're a little worn and have a bit of history about them. Needless to day they're high up away from small hands!

We have some lovely cards sent to us by talented friends including the stag card by Dear Prudence and the robin postcard is by Anwen Williams.

The Elk card is by the very talented Paul Farrell. I love this card and wish I had bought one for someone. The Christmas tree cards in beautiful greens are Our Workshop. The bottom four images are from the brilliant Present and Correct which is a constant favourite of mine. I love their clean and quirky style. They combine a bit of humour, lovely colours, originality and stationery which is a pretty great combination for me. I found all these images a few weeks ago but haven't had time/forgot to post them so apologies if you see something you like and now can't order it in time - bit frustrating possibly! I wanted to share them before the festivities were all done with for another year.

I'll hopefully be back with a little farewell post before I collapse on the sofa and try my best to relax over Christmas and new year!