exploring the mystery of nature with painting & embroidery & mosaic
Puffin Commission Who doesn’t love puffins? With their brightly coloured beaks and funny walk, what’s not to adore about these cute little seabirds? I was recently commissioned to do a puffin embroidery based on the customer’s photo from a trip to Iceland where he spotted lots of wildlife. This puffin was posing on a cliff …
My latest project is a Purple Glossy Starling inspired by seeing one at the Botanical Gardens in Birmingham. I love the way the tail is so long and seems to flow behind the bird like a ribbon as it flies. They certainly are very exotic looking and their feathers change colour as they catch the …
This is a recent commission I completed for a lady in the USA. It’s an American Goldfinch with some thistles – not quite cardoons but that kind of shape. The background is handpainted silk habutai, painted with liquid acrylic inks. I use Liquitex because they are really good quality and bond to the fabric without …
Since I was a small child I’ve always loved kingfishers. This piece ‘The Summer of the Kingfishers’ is inspired by the place down by the river where we used to go to play in the summer and have picnics. And it is where my father used to go as a child, where he learned to …
‘Peacock on a Hilltop’ is a small silk painting embroidered by machine using free machine embroidery and by hand too. I’ve used some rayon and stranded cotton threads for the hand stitching (feather stitch and fly stitch. I’ve added lots and lots of sequins to build up the layers of textures especially on the …
I’m still obsessed with grasses and tall flower spikes. I don’t think it’s going to go away any time soon. There are so many texture and colour combinations to be explored and every time I go for a walk I see something new – some little seeds or speckled leaves, or textured pods. I’ve spent …
[wpg] I added bits of yellow felt and some machine stitching using couched threads to the base fabric first then stitched some little cartwheel stitches in different shades of stranded cottons as well as some fly stitching, and a bit of feather stitch. I like the way they overlap and the colours merge into each …