new work

I've made a few new portraits this week and decided to pop them in the shop! Here's a link!  I've made some scans of them too and next week I'll have a go at playing around with scale and possible prints. I've also been playing around with some brush pens and now I'm inundated with pretty little faces. I have a few to give away so I'll add them as a little thank you gift to the next handful of orders made through the online shop.

I'm off to have a quiet Saturday evening out of the rain. Have a lovely weekend folks!

These little line drawings will be dished out among the next handful of orders from the online shop!

pattern mad

Hello friends! If you follow me on instagram you might've noticed my obsession with patterns. Well, I set my self the challenge of creating 100 patterns over 100 days. A pattern a day! I'm on pattern 12 today and thought it'd be nice to pick out a few of my favourites so far. For the full set, videos and much much more head over to my instagram (@amyjpeg) and take a peek. I'll keep you updated with the creme de la creme here as the project progresses :)

Happy doodling!

Vote vote vote!

Today's the day and there are still a few hours left to vote! Grab a brolly and go go go!  Vote labour! Save our NHS. Support our teachers. Give labour a chance! 

Sketchbook number 2!

Video time! Here's the other sketchbook I'm using at the moment. This ones the neater of the 2 and gradually filling up with patterns and portraits. I prime the pages with blocks of acrylic colour and then draw on them with paint pens. I probably don't need to prime the pages in this one but I find the ink from the pens causes the pages to fall apart in most of my sketchbooks so this is a tactical way around it. It uses up excess paint I've accidentally mixed for other projects too which is an added bonus. Not to mention the obvious block colour background helps make the colours pop. So there's 3 good reasons! It's definitely work in progress.

New cards

The sun is shining and here are some new treats for the shop! Remember a while back I tackled my creative rut by doing some random doodling? I picked a couple of my favourite designs and turned them into cards! I'm so pleased with how they've come out, and now they're in the shop! Each design's available individually and now I've just added the plant designs as a set in case you fancied treating yourself to the collection! Here's a link!

sketchbook video number 1!

As promised, here's a little video I made taking you on a tour around my messy sketchbook (ignore the cheesy radio drama in the background, ha! busted....). I call it my "messy" sketchbook, even though it doesn't look all that messy, because I try to be less precious with the drawings I do in it. I scribble ideas down and play around with patterns, styles and colours. I sometimes take pages I'm pleased with and develop those ideas in neater sketchbooks I have or just dive in and start painting them up bigger! A few of the pages have half finished drawings on them, I probably fell out of love with whatever I was drawing at the time, but guaranteed I'll go back to it with a fresh brain and finish it another day. Some of my favourite pieces have come about like that. 

Anyway, enjoy! Next week I'll show you one of my neater sketchbooks!

ABC

I'm surrounded by incredibly talented people and earlier this year my studio buddy, Cam, churned out a beautiful illustrated alphabet #36daysoftype - go take a peek over on her instagram (@camille_fleur) 

Here's my go at an alphabet. I haven't yet braved doing a different style for each letter BUT maybe I'll give it a go (some day)!  I've never found drawing text an easy process, the style tends to drift and the "font" at the end doesn't look very consistent. I'm not sure I have enough patience left to finish the task by the time I hit 'H'. Anyway I had a go... The shape of these letters are pretty much my default whenever I attempt lettering but to spruce things up I thought I'd add a few decorative touches and some shadows. What do you think?

Definitely work in progress! 

Logo designs!

Here's one of the projects I've been working on - I designed a logo for a local education information blog. I was so pleased with how quickly these designs came about and we actually found it quite tricky narrowing it down to the right one. I thought I'd share some of the sketches I did so you can see the work in progress.

I quite enjoy cobbling together fun looking logos and if you'd like more information on what kind of branding/logo design services I do feel free to get in touch for more info and a quote!

Sketchbook time!

Hello friends! 

I thought it'd be nice to share some of my newest sketchbook doodles. I've been hard at work on little secret projects for people so haven't been able to share anything pretty with you but last week I managed to cram in a bit of sketchbook doodling and these are a handful of my favourite pages so far. I'm still drawing the faces - I can't seem to get enough of these ladies and I'm loving how they're slowly taking shape! I want to paint one up big to hang in my new bedroom but I'm waiting for that dream colour combo inspiration to hit.

The plants, oh be still my heart, those plants! Since I moved house I just want to fill the place with green plants. I only have very shallow window ledges (at the moment!) so they're gradually commandeering the dining chairs and stools, obviously... priorities and all that, ha! Anyway I'm just having to make do with some new plant drawings. I'm keeping them quite simple compared to some of the earlier designs but I'm tempted to paint some up big or possibly get some converted into risograph prints, what do you think??

COMIC time

Hello lovely humans!  

'Want to know a fun* fact about me? (*Debatable) I'm a diary keeper. It's nothing fancy and most definitely not a number one best seller but I started writing a few things down last October and I've managed to keep it up to this day - which is less than a year so it's not saying much! But it speaks volumes to me, ha! It started out as one of those 'line a day' journals and now it's turning into a 'line and a bit a day' journal. I try to pick out little moments in the day that either made me laugh, cry, think, pause or simply pat myself on the back. Some of the entries can literally be as dull as 'I hung up the washing', but sometimes that's exactly the kind of action that needs to be recognised because not every day can fill you with that sense of accomplishment. And also I figured in years to come (possibly) it might be actually quite interesting to look back and read about all those little moments...

ANYWAY! I thought it'd be fun to try and put a few of these little memories into pictures - I've always wanted to have a go at scribbling down some little autobiographical comics and thought what better place to begin. Who knows it might be a new little side project that takes off, no pressure, but for now it's refreshing to try something completely new. 

Drawings for sale!

I've just popped a few of my recent portraits in the Audrey and Illya shop! It's so much fun watching this collection of faces grow and spark new ideas for the next. Every time I finish one I think "MORE", "AGAIN AGAIN", "NOW" - which is quite refreshing post drawing block.

Anyway head over to the shop to see whats up for grabs - I've snuck in a couple of super post May Day bargains too, hurrah!

I've got an afternoon of 'sketchbooking' planned so be prepared for doodle updates/doodle spam over on my instagram (username @amyjpeg).

Enjoy!

shop update!

Hey homies! Just a quick note to let you know I've just popped a couple of new necklaces in the shop, HURRAH! Totally smitten for neon peachy pink colours at the moment. Can you tell??

A lot of lovely folk ask if these beauties will ever be available for wholesale - unfortunately not these ones. I am planning some slightly simpler designs though that could work! So keep you eyes peeled and hopefully these ideas will start to take shape over the summer!

6000! wow!

Yikes! So much instagram love! Thank you lovely humans!!

beads!

HA! I spoke too soon, house stuff takes over your life. I managed to sneak a few minutes in the studio after work today and varnished a batch of beads, which can only mean one thing.....

NEW NECKLACES COMING SOON!

... but now it smells terrible in my studio so I've filled my backpack with pens and books and I'm off home to make a creative nest on my sofa and entertain the cat - she's getting a bit cabin feverish. 

back in the studio!

Woah nelly, what a week! The house move is complete and today is my first day back in the studio doing something that's NOT HOUSE RELATED! PHEW!

I have to admit, I've probably inhaled a fair few dust bunnies this past week and it's made my brain grind to a halt. But, oh boy, it feels good to be back..

Today, rather than start from scratch I decided to play around with some recently started (and temporarily abandoned) paintings - there's an ever growing stack of these forming in the studio, I don't suppose any of you lot do that too?? I think a good portion of my brain is in 'recycle and adapt' mode (I've been using blocks of soap to prop windows open in the new place and building useful things out of boxes of books - THAT kind of mode). So today I decided to adapt a portrait I'd begun a few weeks back (of course my dusty brain forgot to snap a before photo - that would've actually been quite an interesting comparison... I'll do that next time). For those curious I'm using my acrylics on greyboard instead of my paint pens. I just really fancied taking my time a bit with this picture, slow things down a bit after so many hectic weeks... I'm so pleased with the results.

Tribal

Getting a bit more creative with the face paint and trying out some ideas I've had on the to do list for a while...

I tried out a very full colour scheme but I think I'm preferring the more muted/similar colour pallets - especially the pinks, black and white. Anyway, that's one of the nice things about trying these things out, you can't always imagine what they'll turn out like and sometimes it's inspiring to see a finished picture so you can start thinking about ways to develop it.

more portraits..

It's been a busy week juggling house and studio time but I've only got one more sleep until the house move so fingers crossed the juggling won't be going on for much longer. Here are a few of my most recent portraits. I've been focusing on stripping the detail right back and playing around with colours, face shapes and shadows. I'm building up quite a collection so keep you eyes peeled next week when I start to add some new faces to the shop!

I'm on the book...

You can now find me and my doodles on the facebook - here's a link!

faces in the crowd

Sorry for the quiet week. I've been hiding out in the studio or at home - packing. The house move isn't going as smoothly as I'd hoped but that seems to be the nature of this process. Fingers crossed I'll find myself more settled soon - I'm so grateful for this little home away from home (aka studioland) at the moment!

I've been working on those abstract portraits a lot lately - playing around with detail, sometimes stripping it right back and focusing on block colours, which goes COMPLETELY against my nature of drowning pictures in patterns. I think I can safely say I find it hard to leave a picture alone when it's beginning to look finished. I am however enjoying finding a balance between the 2 styles AND watching the face shapes and styles develop.

Here are a handful of new faces I've drawn over the last week...

Just in case you're curious - I've been painting these using paint pens on a piece of watercolour paper primed with block colour acrylic paint. The same process I use in most of my sketchbooks and for all of my drawings. The colourful background makes the paint pen ink "pop" and adds depth - it also helps direct the colour scheme, which can be a decision that'll easily dominate an afternoon and put your doodling on hold.

I've been scanning these drawings as I go along so if you spot anything you'd like to buy please feel free to get in touch and we can talk prices for prints and original drawings!

new faces

I got all inspired by the shadowy portraits I drew in the last project - so I decided to have a go at expanding on the idea and I'm really enjoying the results! These 2 cropped up over the last 2 days and I thought I'd share them with you. They're still very much in the "sketching" zone but I'm having fun watching them develop and gradually fill up with detail. I'm interested in the face shapes and shadows (the shadows need work, but I'm looking forward to practicing them as the project progresses). MORE, BIGGER! That's the next step!

Keep tuned in to see what happens next!