Poppies and Cornflowers, Blue Bubbles and Art Nouveau

I made so many products from last week’s Poppies and Cornflowers design that I haven’t had time to make any cards from it yet!

Customizable Poppies and Cornflowers Travel Mug by helikettle

More Poppy and Cornflower products

Poppies and Cornflowers - Out and About:
HERE
and

Poppies and Cornflowers - At Home
HERE

But I have made some cards from one of my ‘Bubbles’ screenprints.

I think everyone agrees that finding suitable greeting cards for men isn’t easy. I sell a lot of cards for older men, the ones with the almost cartoon-like characters, dancing and jogging and doing altogether unlikely things! But younger and middle-aged men are even more difficult, unless they have a particular hobby or interest that you can build on. Jokey ones are another possibility but I’m no good at that at all.

So sometimes a design that is purely decorative in a non-flowery way, is a solution. Which is where my screenprints come in! A Bubbly Birthday Card -

And here’s another screenprint  - the same design but in different colours. This one will probably find its way on to some customizable smartphone cases and skins sometime soon.

But not this week, if I can find time to develop the design I’ve just painted into a repeating pattern.

It’s based on the tiles in the lovely old, original, early 20th century fireplace in one of my bedrooms, a genuine Art Nouveau design.

I’ve changed the colours slightly but I do like blue, green and white together for a particularly clean, ‘fresh’ look.

The challenge I’ve set myself is to use this tile design to make a pattern that doesn’t look too much like tiles. Not sure at the moment how I can do that so I expect I’ll have to play around with it quite a lot . . . results next time!

Water Soluble Wax Crayons - ideal for letting one's Inner Child out to play!

If you thought I didn't post on my blog last week was because I was taking a summer holiday, you couldn’t have been more mistaken!

Firstly because our ‘summer’ weather has been more like November, not only disappointingly wet but cold and windy as well! At one point I looked out at the frenetically waving bushes and trees and it could have been the autumn, except that, instead of leaves, it was rose petals swirling in the wind!

And I’ve been tremendously busy!

When I sold a relatively huge amount of Father’s Day Cards through CardGnome, I made a start on doodling some ideas on scrap paper for the next upcoming holidays . . .

For Grandparents Day

 For Halloween

But the very next day, CardGnome announced that they will be cutting our artists’ commission from 15% to 5% from July 1st. 

Not good news!

And that decided me to spend less of my time working on greeting cards and more on creating products, which earn a better return. I’ve been moving in this direction ever since Greeting Card Universe announced that they would withhold 30% tax from non-US artists who don’t have an ITIN, followed by their ‘cull’ of cards that they deem ‘un-marketable’, in spite of the fact that they sell well!

I shall still design greeting cards but they won’t be my priority once I can get my head around this shift in emphasis. I’m not finding that easy, in spite of the fact that I very much enjoy creating tea pots and phonecases, coffee mugs and necklaces! 

So I’ve been devising a work schedule that reflects this rejigging of my priorities – and I rather overestimated the number of ‘products’ I could create in a week!

I took last week’s Vintage Roses design and made a new, slightly 'Laura Ashley', design from the little rosebuds -
 

Customizable Pink Rosebuds iPhone 4 Barely There by helikettle

- and made more than 60 'Rosebud' products!

HERE 

are some of them!

Then I came across a treasure trove of screenprints I had made more than 20 years ago. I had printed them in almost 50 different colour-ways so I'll never be short of a design for my week's new products!

Customizable Blue Magenta Abstract Speck Case iPad by helikettle

 HERE

is a selection of them!

As creating nearly 60 products from this one design didn’t leave any time for a new painting last weekend, I uploaded a design from the backlog of cards waiting in the queue. 

Another one of the Cool Cats Collection -

Singing Cats Fun 13th Birthday Card for a Nephew by helikettle

This weekend I was determined to set aside at least a little time for painting and finally tried out my Water Soluble Wax Crayons that I bought months ago with a Christmas Artifolk Voucher. 

I absolutely loved using them – it’s true what they say about them releasing one’s Inner Child! - and I’m sure they will play a big part in my art and design from now on!

This week I'll be working on creating 'products' from this design - and maybe some more of the screenprints if there's time. But I couldn't resist trying out this rather 'loud' design on a Messenger bag straight away:

Poppies and Cornflowers Messenger Bag by helikettle
 

Quite a contrast in style to this week's greeting card upload - 

- but then that's me all over; I'd get bored if I stuck to one style!

On Mugs, Mousepads & More...

...Abstract Screenprinted Designs