Saturday, July 06, 2013

Blogging and big botanical prints

My first post in two months. Not for lack of things going on, as always the opposite is true! Life's been throwing curve balls again and although in some ways the last month or so has been quite challenging and sucky it's also had it's fair share of good stuff so I can't really complain. My little garden is going well, wedding plans are in the works, I&S has a new website on the brink of launch and we're exhibiting at Design Made Trade in 1.5 weeks. All fun stuff.

I also FINALLY got to launch some new designs! We were holding off launching them till the website was ready but my patience ran out. I've reblogged some pictures/text below from the Ink & Spindle blog, hope you like :)


Waratah in Coal & Snow - photo by Sean Fens'

Introducing two new & rather large prints - Waratah and Silver Gum!

WARATAH
"Inspired by the beautiful, unique Tasmania variety of Waratah, this print was originally carved and printed from a lino block, retaining all the beautiful and irregular textures of lino printing."

I  designed Waratah late last year, inspired after a trip to the spectacular Capturing Flora exhibition in Ballarat. I knew that I wanted to firstly develop a lino print and capture the beautiful texture of that medium in a screen print. The carving was done over one rather warm weekend down at Fairhaven, perfect weather to soften the lino!


Waratah - original line drawing & carving the lino


Waratah - lino carving almost complete and made easier with Abby's fancy Japanese carving tools


The final lino print. This was scanned and doubled in size before being turned into a repeat


The final result! Waratah in Coal & Snow


Waratah in Turmeric & Snow

SILVER GUM
"Silver Gum came to life one morning during a bicycle ride to work through Royal Park. Enamoured by the leaf forms, Lara picked these almost-flowering stems and popped them in her pannier for photographing later in the back yard. Both colours in this design are printed from a single screen – the second colour is printed with the screen rotated 180 degrees."

Silver Gum is another one of those designs that spent a lot of time brewing in the back of my mind before finally coming to life. The tricky bit was finding the perfect shaped leaf, but once that happened the rest of the process was fairly straightforward. I can't wait to see this print turned into some gorgeous curtains or upholstery.


Silver Gum - laying out stems for photographing


The final result - Silver Gum in Eucalyptus & Moss


Silver Gum in Almond & Snow

xx Lara.