Update: This doodle was used on one of our most popular greeting cards, Thinking of You Lavender. Find it in the shop here.
Happy Wednesday! This week, I worked on drawing of a bunch of lavender. I love the crisp and clean smell of lavender.
It reminds me of a trip I took to the south of France a number of years ago and the lavender growing all over Provence. I came across a few pics that helped jog my memory of this beautiful place!
This week's card of the week is our "Thanks a Bunch!" thank you note card. We released this design at the National Stationery Show in May and it instantly became one of our bestsellers.
It's probably one of my favorite designs, too, with its cheerful bouquet of flowers. While many of the thank you notes in the collection are very floral-driven, this card is perhaps the simplest.
You can purchase "Thanks a Bunch!" in our shop as a single card or boxed set of 10 cards!
Summer is nearly over and school will be back in session soon. I drew a little yellow pencil earlier this summer and decided to make a fun little pattern out of it.
I had a fun time creating this doodle of little flowers and playing around with some bold color combinations (lemon yellow + purple, brick red + sky blue, magenta + kelly green). When drawing, sometimes I have very particular color combinations in mind and sometimes I have no clue and just see what pops!
Last week I was lucky to have a lot of time to focus on some creative work (they say with creative businesses, you typically spend only 20% of your time on the creative side and the other 80% on running the business, and it's so true!). I ended up with a lot of drawings I'm excited about as well as an idea for a new collection/series (more on that soon!). One thing I found was that I ended up drawing a lot of tiles and geometric shapes. I've been playing around with these tiles...making different patterns and trying out different color combinations. Here's one of my favorites!
Original tile:
Some pattern play:
I stumbled upon the music of The Lumineers about a month ago and their first full-length album has quickly become my summer soundtrack. Their folk rock sound is pretty infectious - think long ballads, foot stomping, hand clapping...So for this week's doodle, I took some lyrics from their song "Ho Hey" and worked on a little hand lettering. The background is a picture from the magical Cannon Beach, Oregon, that I took last summer. Here's the original music video if you are looking for a little blog reading soundtrack.
Hope everyone is having a fun and safe Fourth of July. Enjoy the fireworks lighting up the sky!
I thought I'd pull back the curtain a bit and give you a peek inside my creative process. Each of the cards you see in the shop is originally drawn by hand - by me! So just how does a design go from an idea in my mind to a sketch to a finished card? Here's a glance at the different steps in my creative process.
Doodling
I find myself doodling a lot. My sketchbooks are filled with random drawings and words. Some go nowhere, some turn into the cards you see for sale on this site, and some I revisit months later with renewed interest. Here's some recent sketches I've done.
Pen to Paper
Usually I'll take a preliminary sketch I've drawn and create something in ink. Sometimes I sketch out the design first in pencil; sometimes I just go for it with ink and hope I don't make a big mistake. Armed with some very fine black ink pens, I'll spend time drawing the motifs or patterns on drawing paper. I'm lucky to have a very steady hand.
Here's the original ink drawings for Thanks Vines, Busy Flowers, and Zinnias. With both of the designs for Busy Flowers and Zinnias, I didn't have a set design in my mind - each piece just grew as I went along.
Clean Up and Color
I scan my artwork and use software on my trusty computer to smooth lines, clean up mistakes, and color the artwork. I love playing around with different color combinations and seeing the different possibilities.
The End Result
The final products printed, scored, and ready to be sold!
