Floral inspiration

Summer florals provide such inspiration for my paintings. I particularly love a cottage garden with the tangle of flowers against a fence or a brick wall, the breeze making the flowers move and glide.

I spend hours in my own garden enjoying the changes and the colour combinations that nature provides. You will often find me early morning from 6am wandering in my dressing gown with a cup of tea to see what has changed , what new flowers have emerged. I am also so lucky currently to have my studio at Godinton House which has the most beautiful gardens.

Soaking up the garden

I spend a lot of time just being in the garden, feeling the colours, energy and atmosphere. This is important as I want to convey the sense of the garden not just a visual record but how the garden feels, the breeze, solitude, joy, warmth, growth and change.

Photographs

I constantly take photos of the garden during the year to document the changes, moods and weather as well as the floral displays. Here are a selection…

Sketching

Getting the sense of a floral, trying to distil the shapes and colours which give that feeling. I am not interested in painting each petal but want to create a painting that conveys the drift of flowers the display as a whole. A painting which has marks, depth and movement. To try to achieve this I layer my sketches using a variety of marks, washes and mark making.