Iconemesis Love Illustration and other bits!

I have put a few of my new experimental designs onto iphone 4 cover cases and entered them in the Iconemesis Love Illustration competition. Please go and take a look here and if you like them PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT... as I think the outcome of the competition will be based on social media hits. The winners will see their design put into production! WOW

 

Good news... you may remember my Laughing Owls Tea Towel 2013 Calendar design which I entered in the latest Spoonflower competition? It was placed 11th with 357 votes! Just a little miffed at not making the top ten :( however I have ordered a few to make some Christmas pressies!

No Dream Designs this week, sorry folks but Christmas has arrived in the 'posh gift shop' and we have been so busy placing stock and organising things that I have'nt had much time to dedicate to my lovely blog.

I have also noticed that I have another new member... welcome!

Dream Design 12 - Petra Kern

Today Dream Designs welcomes Petra Kern who is based in Slovenia. After a successful career as a journalist she has started her own creative business and is pursuing her dream of becoming a full-time surface pattern designer. Below she explains why she has chosen this pattern and her dream realization for it.

 

Why I love this design?
I like this design because it says everything about my style which is hand drawn, floral, feminine, dynamic and with lot of colours. I like to play with the patterns and when I see a product I always see it with a pattern or two on it.
 
About me: I recently dropped my job as a journalist and stylist for lifestyle magazines, took several online classes for art and surface pattern designer (ABSPD course!!!) and now I hope to make my living just of surface design. I dreamt about that for sooo long and the funny thing is that I didn't even know that such a profession existed.
 

After looking closely at Petra's work I am really impressed by how charming and pretty it all is. Her portfolio is full of delicate floral and organic patterns, most of them hand drawn or painted. Extremely feminine although rich in detail her work achieves its grace using subtle colour palettes. I particually like a few designs which I noticed have a darker background they remind me of tapestries. Petra claims to be 'drawn to nature' and 'want to capture it's colours', for me she certainly achieves that goal. 

A strong element of her work seems to be the capability to create collections and designs which compliment each other and look good together. This doesn't come easily for everyone and I think it is a truly valuable attribute that will facilitate her success as a surface pattern designer. A good example of this are the patterns shown here for this Dream Design feature. One, two or three designs which knit perfectly together and sit together on the same project.

I strongly recommend you take a look at the fabulous work to be found on Petra's website or catch up with her on facebook here.

Blog feature at THE KIOSK

Yesterday I had a lovely surprise when I discovered that my work was showcased on Esther Cox's blog THE KIOSK. Esther has written a super post featuring quite a few patterns of mine. I cannot thank her enough for writing so many nice things about me and my work. The least I can do is keep working hard and experimenting in the hope that it will all come together pretty soon. Thanks again Esther for such a wonderful post.

Tomorrow I will be back with a new Dream Designs post... don't miss it.

Sneaky peek!

Lately I have been working very hard on my portfolio so as to be ready for when I launch my new website! SOON I hope. Well, I have been experimenting with motifs and shapes which come from my doodleboards... if not what do I doodle for? I have left myself totally free with no rules about colour, subject or brief. I surprised myself by coming up with quite a few floral designs and all repeat patterns, no placement prints this time round. The lovely flowers you see below are one of the 'experiments' using doodleboard bits and a large dose of imagination. I quite fancy this design on a rug, it would look just great in my studio which has yellow walls!