Floating Lemons

Bird Coffee Cup Watercolour (finally!)

I'm not quite sure why it's taken so long to pick up the brushes. There's obviously some element of fear involved here - probably of being disappointed in the end result, as it definitely won't look the same as it does in my mind. But that perfectionist editor within was finally tucked away into a dark corner, and the paints were brought out, and so here's the result.

It's rough, simple, very amaterish, but it's a start. One of my cups for morning coffee!

 

 

And here are a few of the steps (in reverse) I took once the sketch was done in pencil and the brush tentatively picked up,:

 

 

I used watercolours bought from the supermarket for this little test piece, painted into my Seawhite of Brighton square sketchbook from Jackson's. FInally, here's the photograph of the 'real' cup in order to do true justice to its real artist. I'm not sure who that is, so if anybody knows, please do tell. I bought the cup from the markets in Bangalow, Australia a few years back and love her work. You'll see a few more of her cups in the near future.

 

Wishing all of you a triumphant day! Cheers.

 

Creativity, Humour, and an Enamel Tea Mug

 

This was meant to be a quick sketch. ha ha. Took three hours to finish in the end ... The shadow beneath the mug was photoshopped in after the scan, as it looked too much like it was floating in mid-air. Drawn with coloured pencils in a square Seawhite of Brighton sketchbook from Jackson's.

I've added the step-by-step (in reverse) photos below, as well as a photograph I took of the mug before finally drinking the tea. If you manage to read on past that, there are a few notes I made on the link between creativity and humour ...

 

I've been working intensely these past couple of months, building a strong foundation for the business - head in my books and eyes on the computer screen. It took some time to notice that spring had arrived, which led to the realisation that the scales of balance had been tipped too far into the 'serious' zone and that, somewhere along the way, enjoyment of home, and, more importantly, a general sense of humour about life and all that stuff, had been left behind.

This led to thoughts about humour and its link to creativity ... and as fate would have it (don't you just love when that happens?), looking through my inbox I discovered an e-mail with the link to an article on 25 Way to be More Creative where I read this lovely little snippet:

"Laughing has been shown to help people think more broadly, associate freely, and notice complex relationships. One study found that people who had just watched a video of television bloopers were better at solving a puzzle long used by psychologists to test creative thinking.

Edward de Bono writes about humor in his book, “I am Right, You are Wrong”. He explains that humor is based on a logic very different from traditional logic. The significance of humor is that it indicates pattern-forming, pattern asymmetry and pattern-switching. Therefore, humor has the same basis as creativity and lateral thinking."

Had to share. The rest of the article, on the Daring to Live Fully site, is just as wonderfuly motivating or eye-opening, so if you'd like to read it just click here.

hmmm, does this mean that I should start watching television bloopers? LOL. Have a light-hearted, laughter-filled day! Cheers.

 

A New Text Design: Colourful Summertime

The weather finally seems to be catching up with the season and it's getting warmer, the sun is shining, and it's time to celebrate the coming summer. I'm planning to spend tomorrow in the garden again (yay), and to bask in a bit of warm sunshine. Perfect time to clean up and upload a new text design ...

Still experimenting with photography (failing miserably as yet but I'll get it eventually, I will!), here are a couple of shots of the original drawing/sketch in my large 'Ideas' Moleskine journal:

 

Yes, I took it out into the garden (*smile*). And below is the final design, all cleaned up in photoshop and ready for public viewing:

 

 

Colourful and cheerful, don't you think? I've already begun putting it up on products, as you can see here. And if you're curious to see more, here are the links to what I've done so far:

Summertime at Floating Lemons Cafepress

Summertime at Floating Lemons Typography on Zazzle

Summertime fabric collection at Spoonflower

 

Wishing you a happy, bright day! Cheers.

Pencil Drawing: Silver Ring

I'm a bit of a magpie, I love shiny, silver things, and collect them whenever possible (finances permitting). So, when I felt like doing a bit of therapeutic, focussed, drawing, out came one of my favourite rings, metal and reflective, perfect for a couple of hours of concentrated sketching.

Which do you prefer, silver or gold? I'm not much of a fan of the latter but obviously it's a popular metal! Silver seems purer, cleaner, but I've heard those words applied to both metals, so it obviously comes down to individual preference.

At the moment I'm loving the mixture of silver and leather that is making an appearance at the markets and stores, so I may draw one of those bracelets soon - yes, I gave in to temptation and purchased a 'couple' (*cough*). I should never be allowed out of the house, really.

Graphite, drawn in my large moleskine journal. Cheers.

 

Floating Lemons at TwoSmiles!

Last year I was offered a wonderful opportunity when HP contacted me and offered me the chance to work as a designer with them for their new HP Giving Card Site. Those of you who are kind enough to follow my blogs (hello there!) may remember the announcement I made here.

 

They have now officially launched with a fun, new site called TwoSmiles, offering their lovely "TwoSmiles Cards - a gift & greeting wrapped into one special card", a brilliant idea especially for last-minute presents or for those times when you just aren't sure what to give someone on those special occasion days (a problem I face frequently!). I think it's quite perfect and couldn't be more excited and happy at being a part of their talented design team.

Here's a few of the cards I designed for the site, minus the gift card bit that's normally attached to the side of the card. To have a peek at more of them, and at what the final cards look like, pop over to:

TwoSmiles by HP

 

One of my cards is being featured on the front page of the site at the moment, so if you're fast enough you may still catch it up there! I'll be giving into the temptation to be a bit braggy and show-offy within the next few months and showcase my TwoSmiles cards, so please forgive me in advance - but I'm still doing the happy dance at being part of such a lovely site.

Let me know what you think! Have a lovely day. Cheers.

 

Business Books for Right-Brain Creatives

Organizing a business after 6 years of chaos is not a simple task. It's pretty amazing to have come this far relatively intact, despite not having much of an idea of what I was doing - more like a vague goal set in some future misty realm. Sad, I know. So when I realized that it was time to either expand or collapse, I knew that I had to stop procrastinating and tackle the really important basic issues that had been too successfully avoided for too long.

According to 'dull' statistics (These are from www.statisticbrain.com and www.startupbusinesshub.com, but there are a huge number of sites out there pointing out the same awful truth), around 55% of businesses fail after 5 years, due to lack of planning amongst other things. Lack of planning - does that apply here? Unfortunately, yes. Was the business to fail after this long, after having this much love poured into it? No.

Knowing the pitfalls is one thing, however, and deciding to DO something about it is quite another.

 

In February I started digging around for help online and was fortunate enough to bump into a free Video Summit being held at The Right-Brainers in Business, by Jennifer Lee, founder of Artizen Coaching and award-winning author of The Right-Brain Business Plan: A Creative, Visual Map for Success (see book list below). Truly brilliant. She teaches us that business doesn't have to be dry, boring and difficult to tackle at all. On the contrary, it can be fun and creative as well as amazingly successful.

That's all it took - realizing that it was up to me to decide how to approach the whole scary idea of getting Floating Lemons sorted out professionally. Since then I've been devouring books, searching through countless websites, and, most important, actually beginning to weave everything together. The filing, the planning, the schedules and templates (I've been creating my own on Word and Excel ... yes, I'm a bit of a wanna-be geek!), and even, as I've mentioned before, the dreaded accounts.

I'm not saying that it's a well-oiled machine running smoothly ... yet. But determination and visualization are throwing me into it with a fervour normally reserved for art. That's a good thing, a very very good thing.

I won't bore you with all the details. We all have different problems to tackle and different approaches. The books below, however, have been eye-openers in one way or another, truly. If you're having the same problems and would like to learn how to approach the whole left-brain process in a relaxed, creative, right-brain way, start collecting them ... They haven't all been read yet, there are a couple that are opened regularly for choice bits of info, and others being read for the second time, but I'll eventually go through the lot.

Here's the list of books and their respective websites:

 

1. The Handmade Marketplace by Kari Chapin - karichapin.com
2. Grow Your Handmade Business by Kari Chapin - karichapin.com
3. The Right-Brain Business Plan by Jennifer Lee - www.rightbrainbusinessplan.com
4. The Icarus Deception by Seth Godin - www.sethgodin.com
5. I Just Like to Make Things by Lilla Rogers - lillarogers.com

 

The websites are listed to the right of each book link, I suggest you explore those further to get an all-round idea of each author and check out all the exciting things they have worked out for us to learn from. I check them out regularly.

In a week or so I'll be putting up my experience with the whole business of blogging. Yes, I've been hard at it, and normally I'd be whining and complaining at the amount of work thrown my way (by no other than myself), but I'm seriously enjoying this whole 'looking at the left-brain via the right-brain' experience. I hope you do too!

If any of you have any books that you would recommend adding to the list, please let me know as I'm constantly on the search and still learning, and every little bit counts. I'm now off to create a visual interpretation of my business plan. Cheers.

 

The links on the list above have my amazon associate referral attached to them. That's because I appreciate every penny that comes my way. But I would never recommend anything I hadn't already read, purchased or really want to have in my greedy little hands. If you purchase anything via my links you have my deepest thanks and appreciation! Cheers.

 

Quick Sketch: Asparagus Bunch

Squeezed in a quick sketch of a bunch of asparagus before they were cooked and gobbled up. Used coloured pencils, in a large moleskine journal.

Still busy working on the business side of things ... catching up on 6 years of chaos is not an easy thing, but we're getting there. Everything is getting streamlined, organized and planned and it's a joy. More about that soon!

Have a wonderful day. Cheers.

 

A Scattered Flowers Doodle & Learning Business Creatively

Here's a doodle from one of the small moleskine journals, drawn a while back. Scattered flowers and ladybirds ... or ladybugs to some of you. It will be worked on further and turned into a pattern or illustration. One of these days. Soon.

It's been a bit of a struggle getting back into the swing of things after a wonderful two week holiday! It's normally difficult enough to settle back into a routine at the best of times, but at the moment there's even more work than ever ahead, as I'm back to working on my own and therefore having to reorganize and start from scratch, and learn how to build the business up properly so as to clamber (crawl?) onto the next step and help it evolve the way it needs to in order to expand.

The good news is that I've very recently discovered a true pleasure in the left-brain puzzles of setting up a business. As a result, not only have all schedules, designs, research, plans, finances, etc. now been organized into files and folders -- as they should have been ages ago, yes I know -- so that all information is in one place within easy reach, but everything concerning goals, projections, visualisations and aims, is being heavily soaked into this very awestruck brain cell of mine. Even the dreaded accounts. It's helped to finally focus on the priorities so that all the dead wood can be chopped off, allowing the important basics to flourish instead.

 

There's still a lot to be done. Wish I'd realised a lot sooner that it was this much fun, but, having had absolutely no idea of what was involved, most of the last few years have been spent avoiding the whole issue until it HAD to be tackled.

Fortunately, a good friend with a very impressive professional background, who is brilliant at  greatly inspiring brainstorming sessions, is helping out one morning a week with the steps necessary to build a strong foundation - it's all stuff that's probably basic to you lot out there who know all of this already, but it's absolutely amazing and a huge eye-opener for me.

A wonderful new discovery has been that of a whole host of books and online sites that concentrate on helping creative right-brainers set up business in a playful, visual and non-scary way. Look out for a list of those to be posted here very soon, in case anyone out there needs help the way I did (and still do). If you have any tips or stories about your own creative business journey, please do share!

As you can see, the business side of things has kept me busy ... but it's now time to get the art and blogging plan re-sorted too. Back to work. Have a lovely day! Cheers.

 

Featured at Do What You Love Blog

I've only just arrived back from my holiday (no internet for a whole week, horrors!) and have barely had time to settle back in, so I was absolutely delighted this morning to find that my Fall Tango Pattern Collection was being featured on the lovely Do What You Love blog as part of the showcase of designs from the Module 2 graduates of the brilliant The Art and Business of Surface Pattern Design e-course that I took recently. It's such a thrill to see it up there, especially among patterns by such truly talented and amazing designers.

Back to reality, I'm about to do a huge spring-clean of both home and studio, so it might be a few days before I manage to indulge in creating any art to post here. Also have to work out a blogging schedule, so forgive me if things seem a bit haywire around here for the coming week or so. Have a great day! Cheers.

 

The Selvedge Spring Fair 2013

Yesterday morning I braved the snow to go to the Selvedge Spring Fair 2013 at the Chelsea Town Hall. And yes, it's meant to be spring and yes, it's snowing here in London. Not cold enough for it to stick, but the flurries and the drop in temperature are all too real. Fortunately, I found it exhilarating rather than bleak, and the walk down the King's Road was well worth it.

What a wonderful collection of crafters, designers, artists and bright, colourful, cheerful products. I've taken a few photos so I'm going to give you a quick peek at just a small pick from the amazing choice of goods on display.

First of all, here's the gorgeous goody bag I received at the door ...

 

 

And here are some of the wonderful crafters and their goods ...

 

Sam Pickard

 

hensteethart

 

Jan Constantine

 

Gudrun Sjödén

 

Rosehip Cards

 

I finally gave in to temptation and bought a few lovely notebooks from Rosehip Cards, one for myself and the other two for gifts for the family - aren't they sweet?

 

 

And finally, I'll leave you with photos of two of my favourite stores on the street, Anthropologie and Cath Kidston ... next time I visit I may be brave enough to walk in and allow myself to be tempted by their bright products, but this time I trudged past - through the sleety rain - to get back to the warm cosy flat.

 

Anthropologie King's Road

 

Cath Kidston

 

I'll definitely be back next year. Today I ventured forth to the Ideal Home Show, so, time permitting, I'll post that within the next few days. But it's now time to pack my bags, as early tomorrow morning we're off to Spain! Apparently the weather may not be the best out there either (more rain?) but at least it'll be warmer ... I'll post any lovely, non-art-related, inspirational images over at my Musings blog. Cheers.