It’s always exciting to work to a brief and to have a project. I have spent the past few weeks researching my topic. While I have usually had a natural leaning to painting and drawing florals I was asked to design a range featuring chickens. They are such a delight to watch and fortunately my brother has hens. So after numerous, photos and sketches here is my collection which are available on various products through Redbubble.
A great way to get your work noticed is to enter design competitions, of which there are loads. I recently participated in an Instagram challenge to create a floral a day for 30 days which was posted by Print Fresh a Philadelphia based design studio. I was only able submit 6 designs because I started late and I work full time, so weekends are my painting time. I had loads of fun and thoroughly enjoyed creating the florals and seeing all the work of other participants. I would have loved to have been doing it everyday for the 30 days.
There are many arguments for and against entering these design competitions, this one written by Neil Bennett for DigitalArts for example and its worth finding out what designers think.
I enter because it’s an opportunity for me to take on a design brief – to challenge myself and my ability to meet a brief, to improve design skills and to do something that may not necessarily be about my own design preferences. Posting publicly also gives me some excellent insight into which designs are popular and I must say I am usually very surprised. Designs that I have spent considerable time on and that I quite like are often the least favourite.
So here are some recent posts I made for the Print Fresh Instagram. Which one is your favourite? Enjoy!
Lazy Daisy
In the Pink
Daisy Chain
Gabbie
Retro Rose
Petal
I am so fortunate to have the opportunity travel. My favourite place is textile heaven – India. Apart from the most extraordinary range of textiles in the world, everything a textile designer could possibly desire is there – India is a visual feast.
The colours are mesmerising and full of joy, texture and pattern abound – everything from the architecture to fragments of debris scattered on the street or the remains of posters layers on the walls bordering major roadways, beautifully painted trucks and finely painted henna to celebrate a wedding , huge bundles of flowers at the flower markets ready to be strung together and taken to the temple. I find it so inspiring. The images below were taken in Chennai, Kolkata and Jaipur.
Orange, fuchsia, turquoise, purple joy ! Take me there………………
Have a look at my Rebubble portfolio- you can shop here too. Great thing is, this is a sustainable way of producing textile and other products. Designs are only printed to order, so no speculation production. Use it and keep it forever or until it is totally worn out.
It’s Sunday and I spent the morning in the garden with the rest of the Community Crew getting ready for the Autumn planting. I’s a gorgeous day – sun shining, breeze blowing, big blue sky. But I couldn’t wait to get home to start another design challenge – this time set by http://designcompetition.tigerprint.uk.com. The challenge is to design wrapping paper or gift cards for the Marks and Spencer Customer and to only use black and white.
To create this collection I used a range of blocks that I have cut out of waste material that I scrounged from Reverse Art Truck. It’s perfect as it has one side that is adhesive and it sticks well to the various sized blocks that I have picked up about the place. I also use all sort of things I find around the house to create patterns and can spend hours stamping onto paper. Here is one of blocks I used for the prints above and below.
It has been too long between creative breaks. I am now in the very fortunate position of being able to take some time out from my full time job. I am taking this opportunity to return to painting, drawing and manipulating imagery using Photoshop and Illustrator and to reflect on textile design practice and teaching.
I have also made time to join the Moreland Community Garden, which has enabled me to fullfil a dream of having a decent space in which to have a garden (but also all the enormous benefits of sharing and meeting new people) . I am also a volunteer with the Tree Project which again is helping me fulfill my desire to grow things. And will most likely squeeze some travel into this short space of time. I am so happy to be able to mix all these passions together and see what comes out the other end.
So, for my first post. I picked these berries on the way to the garden last week.
Here is one of my first sketches… Winter Berries
A sketch using gouache and watercolour
Julia Raath 