A travel commission

I can finally share this with you! HURRAH!

My latest client commission has been an amazing piece to work on.  Back in 2009 I went travelling with my sister for a year, and if you look far enough back on this blog, I'm sure there are a few posts on it too!  Before, during and since I went travelling many others have done so as well.  One of which was a friend of a friend who went with her boyfriend and did a similar trip to myself.  As a birthday present for him, she commissioned me to illustrate 16 of their top destinations / experiences.  Amazing no?

Going left to right on each row:

1.  Christ Redeemer

2.  Iguassu Falls

3.  Maccu Picchu

4.  Salt Flats

5.  Bunji Jumping New Zealand

6.  Sky Diving and Pancake Rocks

7.  Patronus Towers

8.  Sydney Harber

9.  Angkor Thom

10.  Federation Square, Melbourne

11.  Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum

12.  Lanterns in Hoi Ann, Vietnam

13.  Hong Kong Skyline

14.  Terracotta Army

15.  The Great Wall of China

16.  Tori Red Gates

I absolutely loved working on this, although it has given me seriously itchy feet to jet off to a beach somewhere lovely and exotic.  I'll have to resist for now, and enjoy these pieces instead.

Have you been to any of these amazing places?

Drum roll please...!

HURRAH!

Thank you all for your entries, your RT's (re-tweets) on Twitter, the shout outs, passing it on, spreading the word...etc etc etc.  I really appreciate it.  My little online shop has been a bit 'bish bash bosh' since I first opened it, and to be honest I've found it hard to get people to let me know what they think.

Therefore, I have loved reading your valid points you've shared with me and look forward to putting it all into action.  Thankfully a lot of the points boil down to the same thing,.  Otherwise I would have 15+ different areas to work on within one little shop and that may of broken me (I would of got there eventually of course!) but two main issues, is what I've summed up and that's great.

I am proud to announce the winners - woohoo!

The grand winner is Jodi of Art by Wiley.

My lovely runner up's are Juliet of 'The Crafty Green Poet', Audra of 'Audra James' and Jasmin of 'A Couple of Photos'.

I'll be working closely with Jodi to complete the illustration she wants and the runners up will be sent goodie bags in the post this week.  One of which will contain a lovely necklace by Naida Crystal.

I was going to share with you all what I put in the goody bags but got so excited with my new packaging that I completely forgot to take photos - drat! 

30 Days of Creativity 2012

30 Days of Creativity is something that Create Stuff do every year in June.  In order to participate you have to pledge to them that you will do something creative everyday throughout June aka 30 Days.  It's a great project and it really tests you!

30 Days of Creativity 2011

Last year was my first year, and I found that I mainly created greeting cards along with doing creative things in the cafe I was working at, Seasons Cafe @ Rowan.  You can see photos of what I did here.

This year, when I pledged that I would create something everyday in June, I pledged also to myself that this would be 30 illustrations of buildings.  Buildings, cities, architecture...this is what I love to illustrate.  It's not always that I get to do this so I thought I'd take the opportunity (& excuse) to get on with illustrating what I love.

In the past, for projects when I've chosen to illustrate buildings, I've generally drawn whichever takes my fancy, be it one that I am near at that moment in time, or if it's one I saw on my travels at some point.  For this pledge, I decided to stick to a building that I had seen on that particular day.  Apart from one.  There was one rather dreary day when my thoughts were elsewhere, maybe you can guess which one I'm talking about?

 

To see the rest of my 30 Days of illustrated buildings please click on over to my 'down your street' blog where I keep all of my illustrations of lovely buildings.

www.downyourstreet.blogspot.com

They Draw and Travel - Map no.2

London Town

The lovely Nate and Salli launched a competition for the prettiest map on their 'They Draw and Travel'  website/project called 'You-topia'.  Last year I illustrated a map of Fiji for them, which I loved doing so much - you can read about that here.  So when I read about this contest, it spurred me on to do another map for them!  I chose London, as it's my closest city.  I've recently started working there, and I just love it!  This map is full of a few of my favourite things to do during the day in London.  There was no way I could fit everything in and for people to appreciate it all as well!  

Hopefully there will be more time this year to do more maps.

Materials: Watercolour paints, black fine liner, digital text.

Sweet Shop Illustration Range

I have recently taken it upon myself to do a range of illustrations for my local sweet shop, Old Amersham Sweet Shop (also because they ask very kindly when I go in and they display my illustrations above the counter).  If you are around the area I would definitely recommend stopping by to pick up 100g of your favourite sweets in a pink striped bag!

These prints will be for sale as greetings cards and also as (5x7in) prints, in the shop as well as in my Etsy shop soon!

Love Heart

The Original 'Great British' Lolly

Life is like a box of chocolates

Lucky Dip

Love Heart Lolly

Which is your favourite sweet?  Personally, I love a mix of tangy apples and milk bottles :-)

Frasier

Frasier

Frasier was my first illustration commission of a dog.  Therefore quite a bit of pressure, nerves, excitement going on.  Luckily, I actually know Frasier quite well as he belongs to friends of the family. I think I've captured his cute little face, and the client seems very happy with them indeed!  There are 2 paintings of him, one face on and one a side view.  The couple who commissioned Frasier were buying them for each other for Christmas, as a little extra I wrapped both up so they would both have a christmas surprise!  I had a lovely phone call on Christmas morning praising my work, which was so nice as even though I was really proud of my work, it's the clients thoughts on the end product that count the most.

They were lovely enough to take some pictures of Frasier up in their house.  He now has a new home towards the front of the house, going up the stairs, so anyone coming into the house will see him!  To say I'm chuffed is an understatement! 

If you're interested in having me do an illustration of your pet (not just dogs!) or maybe it's a friends birthday coming up?  Please get in touch, either by leaving a comment here, email me charlotte_vallance@hotmail.com or by phone 07793710416 - please be sure to leave a name and number if I don't manage to answer.

Thank you for reading!

Thank you

Thank you friends and family for a lovely Christmas!

Last year I went for the classic round swirly lollypop and this year we have the Christmas tree edition!  It always inspires me at Christmas dinner to see these lollies staring at me, waiting for me to finish my dinner.  Yes thats right, they are sat in the middle of the table looking lovely, the whole time!  So, of course, come thank you card writing, they are all I can think about!  I thought I'd share my process of the watercolour with you all.  It's different to normal you see.  I have not used any black fine liner, or fine liner of any colour for that matter.  And for once, I have taken the time to do layers of colour!  It was slowly built up over a day, very patiently I might add, to give it a deeper, vibrant colour.

Enjoy!

X

Sinterklaas

I always worry a lot about presents.  This stems from the thought and idea that I really want the person receiving the present to love it and not be disappointed.  But also for it not to sit in some cupboard for the next year!

So now I know my boyfriends family better than i did last year, so for Sinterklaas (5th December) we celebrated at their home in Oosterhout, Holland.  There was food, drink, family and presents!  I also felt much more in control this year, as last year I was spoilt rotten and had no former warning...this year I was prepared.

These are the paintings that I did for my Boyfriend's Mum and Dad.  The garden is for his Mum and the Landrover is for his Dad.  I must admit, I think there were a few tears!

Have you made any presents this year?  Leave me a link so I can check them out!

Zine Project

This post shows my drawings for a zine workshop we did at uni. As im normally a printmaker i wanted to make use of using another medium so i opted for watercolour and ink, some have come out really well, others not so much, but overall I'm pleased with my exploration into watercolour and the drawing of things I wouldn't usually think about drawing!