the weekend

was a bit mad. We had a wonderful time at Go Ape - it really is worth having a go, even if you aren't all that confident with stuff like heights or swinging between trees and climbing rope ladders. I love that kind of thing so it was perfect fun for me. We went with a bunch of my school friends and their partners and spent the rest of the weekend eating, playing Cluedo badly (ever tried it drunk?) and drinking too much. I am exhausted and a bit fluffy today as a consequence.


This week I'm doing another Dorling Kindersley book spread, this time on famous alien abductions. I am really enjoying drawing UFOs!

Hope you all had a good weekend. I need another one right now...

Happy weekend!

I'm afraid I'm too busy with work today to write or draw anything here. Please forgive me. Tonight we are welcoming weekend guests to our house who will be going with us tomorrow to swing amongst some trees in Thetford Forest. I am looking forward to climbing trees and behaving like a boy with some of my very best friends. Then we will have a big party in our tiny house, cook dinner and make a mess. We are calling it a 'house-cooling' party: a last hurrah before we move on.

Hope you have a good weekend.

The Old Cinema

Bleurgh. I have been empty-headed all week, sleeping poorly (I have been itching and thrashing at night - what's that all about?) and at a bit of a loss creatively. I haven't got much to say for myself, I'm sorry.

The husband and I went to a local pub last night to watch my darling Tottenham beat Manchester City 1-0 to gain a Champions League spot for next season. It was the sweetest victory we have had all season, but I was quaking in my seat for pretty much the whole match. Sorry if you haven't got a clue what I'm talking about, or if you couldn't give a s***, but I just had to write this down, I was so happy :-)

So, have I got anything good to tell you (other than my football news which, to me, is good!)? I just came across this shop in London called The Old Cinema which labels itself as London's only department store dedicated to selling antique, vintage, retro and upcycled furniture. The pictures on their website certainly make the showroom (in Chiswick) look worth visiting, with art exhibitions on the walls and a huge amount of stock to drool over.

There are pieces from a wide range of eras, mostly 20th century, but some of it a bit too, uh, retro for my taste. However, here's a small selection of the things that I liked. What did I choose? The usual suspects for me - industrial steel furniture (there's LOADS of it!), lockers, desks and haberdasher's cabinets. Am I getting boring?




(top image left) French soccer lockers, £625; (top image right) steel and brass lockers, £480; (above) Danish rosewood desk, £1050; 1950s draughtsman's desk, £1200; oak haberdasher's cabinet, sold.

I also liked some of the lighting, especially the anglepoise desk lamps. Ah, if only I had loadsa money, eh?

I've just received a commission with a very tight deadline so I'm off to work for the rest of the day. I will post a new drawing if I have time!

One Hundred Days no.91

I'm busy on an illustration job today, so here's an onion for now :-)

One Hundred Days no.90

Another thing involving vinegar...

the weekend

Image above from www.highpeak.gov.uk

Hope you all had a good weekend and (here in England) Bank Holiday. I spent it up in Birmingham with my family. Lots of marvellous things were achieved: we went shopping, attended a charity fashion event for which I made a promotional film a while ago, went on a random family jaunt to Buxton, and, most importantly of all, I wore those peg leg trousers I wrote about a while ago. Yes, I was brave enough. OK, I was in Buxton - hardly the place to exhibit ones sartorial edge - and got a few weird looks from passers by who must have thought I was wearing pyjamas, but I enjoyed it anyway.

We went to Buxton because the husband and I spotted a few magnificent townhouses in need of renovation that were for sale at very affordable prices. Buxton is not at all in our first choice of area, but we have been spreading our search very wide in order to find a house that suits our requirements. My family has been in the business of buying and selling property for a long time, so we all piled into the car and went off for a day trip and to nose around some houses. There were houses with turrets, B&Bs, eight bedroom townhouses, blocks of flats... it is amazing what you can get there:


I had a day of fantasizing about running a bed and breakfast business (the bottom two images) - imagining how I would decorate the rooms with clean whites and simple furnishings, imagining the delicious breakfasts I would serve... and then I thought about having to do all the washing and cleaning myself and thought better of it!

Alternatively, this beautiful grade II listed townhouse in Ruthin has just come on the market and I am drooling buckets over it. It has original shutters in one of the downstairs rooms (can you see them in those right-hand windows?), four bedrooms, four attic rooms, sitting room, dining room, kitchen, huge pantry AND a good sized garden. All in need of a whole load of renovation. I want!

One Hundred Days no.89

So I didn't draw any ferrets, but I did draw a bottle of vinegar.

Happy weekend all. I am off to visit my family in Birmingham.

OK. I need to get a grip

I am going to stop moaning and get on with things. I have a silly idea for a children's picture book that I want to draw some sketches for. Even if it ends up as portfolio nonsense it's better than sitting around and doing nothing. And it involves drawing ferrets and food. A good combo, right? Maybe I'll do something related to it for this afternoon's One Hundred drawing. I've just sent off my first draft for the Dorling Kindersley book spread. I don't know if I've spent quite enough time on it - I am so lazy sometimes and just do things on autopilot, colouring in on Photoshop. Just for fun, here is a snippet from it:



Simple, colourful, silly.

One Hundred Days no.88

I'm falling behind with this. Never mind. This one today is a 'default mode' drawing - another inexplicable human-animal interaction. Maybe it's a snapshot of some conversation that's going on inside my head...

I'll see if I have something more interesting to say for myself later today.

J.Crew in the UK

I hear that big American brand, J.Crew, will be launching in the UK on Net-a-Porter some time soon. I really like the look of their Fall/Winter'10 collection, so I'm looking forward to seeing what will be available here. That green coat above makes me wish it were autumn already! I must be crazy.




Sorry I've not been doing drawings this week. Distracted.

Sale at The French House

On the brighter side, The French House have added some good things to their sale section this week, including a rank of folding chapel seating for £250 down from £360, this green locker for £175 down from £300, and these rather spiffing benches for £125 each, down from £325. Yes, please!

listless... and a sneak peek

Hello all. I don't know what's been wrong with me these last few days. I am feeling listless and aimless. I know I should be pushing myself to do new work or to be creative in some way but I just can't be bothered. I think I'm feeling bored - bored of myself and my silly drawings, bored of being myself, really. Perhaps I'm finding it hard to be settled, or to focus on long-term plans when all I am thinking of is trying to move house and keeping my fingers crossed that I will sell my London flat soon. In short, I am disturbed.


I'm working on a sweet little job for Dorling Kindersley books this week involving one of my favourite subjects: mad scientists at an exposition. Here's a snippet from the rough I sent over the other day. It's obviously in its early stages...

Wales

Here are just a few shots from some of our walking in Wales. I can't wait until I can do this every weekend!



Hope you all had a good weekend. What did I do? I filled in lots of forms for house-selling, roasted a chicken and raided some charity shops (EIGHT new Le Parfait and Kilner jars for 50p each?! A no brainer, I think). On Sunday we rounded up all the awful unwanted gifts and junk that have been cluttering up our loft space and carted it off to sell at a car boot sale. The husband and I looked like proper market sellers in his flat cap, my wax jacket and home-sewn florals, and especially with his Yorkshire accent. We even made money from some godawful things that we thought would never sell. OK, the leopard-print dessert plates that were a wedding gift were uniformly ignored, but we managed to get rid of some other horrors despite their ugliness. What fun!

One Hundred Days - no. 87

Here's something I drew in London at the Hunterian Museum last week.

Have a good weekend, all - I hope the nice weather holds out!