photography

seasonal colour palettes in the garden

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I love the signs of Spring. The yellow of the primroses in the banks, and the brighter yellow of the daffodils. The optimistic pink of the blossom on the fruit trees is here and the fresh green leaves are unfurling in the hedgerows. The garden has transformed in the last two weeks, from the yellows of the daffodils to the shocking pink, orange and red tulips. The rhubarb is in full swing and the purple sprouting continues. The garden is full of activity, with birds building nests, and plants reawakening. We’ve made it through the cold of winter, the days are longer and with any luck, warmer!

In celebration I’ve made two colour palettes from the photographs I took this weekend. Making coloured stripes from photographs was a holiday project we were set before starting art school, but we had to paint the stripes, rather than digitally capture them in pixels. Some things change, but my love of capturing colour continues! I’ve made a few palettes over the years, so check back over the blog posts and you can see more.

A trug of harvest – rhubarb, purple sprouting, tulips and daffodils, and a vase of daffodils and tulips

Greece: pattern, colour, material, finish

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A precious holiday to Greece in the early summer has provided plenty of nourishment for my creativity, as well as excellent down-time, walking and eating. It’s just taken me a long time to get this post together!

I’ve been creating photographic records of artefacts collected on holidays for some time – a great way of remembering the specifics of a walk without having to bring it all home! I’ve also enjoyed creating composite images to represent experiences over the years, some featured on the posts here, so I’ve done the same for Greece.

We visited the Cyclades, and specifically the islands of Santorini and Sifnos. The night on Santorini was for old-time’s sake, and the stay on Sifnos was to get to know an island we’d not been to before. It is a beautiful island, with lots to explore – I’d love to go back to one day!

Here’s a collection of precious finds from the 70+km of walks across Sifnos on their excellent trails, some very prickly! As marble was everywhere I thought it appropriate to use the marble table by our room as the background surface:

First up with the composite images – colour:

Next up: pattern, material & finish, including Greek yoghurt and honey of course:

and finally, the streets of Santorini:

catching up with pattern

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It’s been a while since posting here, but I’ve been busy enjoying summer adventures and developing exciting pattern research alongside getting the academic year underway. I’ve also moved in to a new studio space so I’ll share that in due course.

My pattern research focusing on the repeat print block and how it can be used to generate multiple variations to evolve pattern options continues, with sampling with screen and lino printing. I thought I’d share the more structural outcomes here, linking back to my book art practice. I enjoy discovering links that connect the broader practice I’ve developed over the last twenty five years.

As I folded the sheets of printed pattern the forms appeared to suggest a built environment so I explored the idea a little in how I photographed the pieces. Testing scale and contexts is a vital part in developing a pattern, and I enjoy the possibilities.

summer colour palettes

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Colour inspires me. I love to work with colours; creating pairings and partnerships of colour to build reactions between them, evoking moods and setting a spirit through colour choices. I notice colour relationships every day, and enjoy considering why certain colours thrive alongside others. I love to wear colours too, and like to contrast materials as well as colour to create interesting relationships. I do worry if I find myself in brown trousers and a green top – I don’t want to look like a tree!

Over the last eighteen months I’ve spent time mixing colour using gouache paints, matching colours perfectly with items collected from walks. Little collections of seaweed, shells, catkins, feathers and leaves have sat patiently in the studio while I mix and match. I’m good at matching colours and would be perfectly happy spending hours a week doing just that.

I also enjoy creating colour palettes, sometimes for projects, or my teaching sessions, and sometimes just because what I see around me suggests a perfect palette to explore and create. Our garden has been a bit of a project over the last two years and this summer the new borders are filled with colour that bring such joy to me. My mood is lifted when I see colours working together well. Here are two results from a photograph taken in the garden earlier this month, just because the splashes of colour were pleasing enough to capture.

I like the dominant green that provides the backdrop for the brighter colour accents, and the shapes of the flowers are like splashes of colour dropped in to the soothing green. The pink, red and orange provide the warmth, while the blues are calming and restful. The depths of the border at the bottom of the flower stems are dark, no doubt cool away from the summer sun.

I decided to explore the role proportions of colour play in a palette in the second image. The width of each colour stripe is representative of the area it covers in the image. Back in 1994 this was one of the summer projects I was tasked with as I started my degree in textile design – and all these years on I still enjoy doing it! You can see how the colours perform when dominant, or work as accent colours in thin slithers. There are always main characters and supporting roles in a palette, but it takes all sorts to put on a performance!

When selecting the colours in the image for the palette I worked with the larger areas of colour first, then looked to see how the colours had natural partners to sit next to in the stripe. The accent colours grab the attention of my eyes. Both images reflect the same colour palette, but present themselves quite differently.

winter palettes

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I’ve not had much time for colour mixing with gouache recently but I’ve really enjoyed noticing the contrasts of seasonal colours on our walks so I thought I’d celebrate that here. Some colours are exaggerated by bright sun, while the recent frosty mornings provide a muted coating.

Taking time to notice these small delights are ever more important as we spend few hours outside. I noticed today there was daylight in the sky at 5pm, so that and the first sights of snow drops and daffodils are putting me in the mood for springtime.

Brassica purple, harvest time

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Having sown the seeds for purple sprouting last summer it has been the usual long wait until harvest time, but we have been picking it for the last few weeks. It always feels good to pick the brassica because the new season of crops are a while off harvesting.

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The purple of the sprouting inspired my colour palette for the Plot to Plate tea towels.

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I can’t resist colour matching, so here we are again …

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evolving colour in the making

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A walk in the Spring sunshine gave impetus to a very simple and mindful exercise back in the studio; to make the colour of the landscape. A sprig of willow contains so many different colours. Those colour qualities will alter as the clouds skud across the sky casting shadows, and as the sun ripens the buds.

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With paints at the ready I knew it wasn’t about making the one colour, but the narrative of generating colour as my process of journeying from one to the next. I wanted to paint each of the swatches of colour I mixed as I evolved the paint story, observing and recording the subtleties of the change in hues. Selecting a limited number of tubes of gouache to begin made it more interesting. To start I selected the dominant colour I was aiming for, and had a little piece of nature with me as reference. I developed the swatches of colour, selecting one, and then another hue to achieve, step by step, slowly and patiently filling the page.

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Gouache is a beautiful paint and this exercise reminded me of a wonderful morning teaching colour mixing to BA1 Textile Design students earlier this year. Getting the right amount of water, ensuring the colours are cleanly mixed, and then making that one painted line flat and even – it all takes practice.

KFarley_ytubes_colour_1500_KFI was lucky enough to have excellent colour teaching during my time at art school and consider myself strong at seeing and achieving the right colour mix. At uni I remembering saying to the print technician “it’s nearly right, I’m happy with it”, and she’d say, “Kate, it’s not what you set out to make, keep going until you get there!” I thank her for teaching me that persistence and these days my students know I’m particular (a preferred word to fussy!) when it comes to colour. Getting the colour right is so important and you may as well enjoy the journey to get it right. Textile products sit alongside fashion and interior items made from other materials, and the colours need to match / coordinate, so quitting before you get the right colour may be a sales / employment disaster too!

Interestingly, some of my current students were discussing my approach to colour recently and one shared that I’m not keen on black outlines around shapes in print designs. Another one commented that they hadn’t heard that, but would keep it in mind. I jumped in to defend the comment I’d originally made – a black outline is too obvious, unquestioning, the default, rather like Times New Roman black typeface when you open Microsoft Word. Too easy. I ask students and designers to think about whether the black line is the best for the design. If you think of all the other colours you can use, I think you may find another and better alternative!

At the end of this colour mixing time I am left with souvenirs of the process, memories of the walk and beautiful colour. This is real colour away from the back lit screen I too often see colour from. I shall do this again.

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bespoke pattern for Birmingham BHX

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Designing bespoke pattern for clients is something that I have made a key professional design interest. Communicating a sense of place, historic reference or activity as pattern is what I really enjoy and over the years I’ve been on many site-visits to interesting places to learn about what the client would like or definitely not like. This visit was no different. I love the anticipation of finding out more, a new project to get to grips with, and all my design experience to apply to the challenge …

Some of my previous design work was used as a reference for context images by the original architects, proposing my patterns and stating my details – note – never send artwork without your contact details attached! Phone calls were made, samples were sent, bids were accepted and then a call-up. Please come to the airport for a meeting. There’s a tight deadline, a budget, and something the client knows they want. In a nutshell the brief: Celebrate Birmingham’s buildings in a one colour, repeating pattern that works close up in detail and from a distance as a visual rhythm. Buildings need to be identifiable.

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With any project I carry out research, ask the client lots of questions and evolve a design approach subject to the answers to my questions. Production methods, fabricators, material choices, colours, budgets, time-scales and of course client ambition for the project shape the design language and development of the project. I set off to take photographs of central Birmingham and climbed tall landmarks to get good views. I took photographs, made sketches as well as notes. I had some buildings in my mind I knew needed to be included but I also wanted to use others , less iconic ones, as visual rhythms to play with negative and positive shapes across the composition.

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Back in the studio I chose paper cut-outs as a clear graphic way to create the buildings, as I have done for several commissions including for the Barbican and TfL posters. Once the individual buildings were cut out I scanned in the artwork and spent many hours moving everything around in Adobe Illustrator. I was testing rhythms in and out of repeat and shifting scale, proportions and pairings. This can send me back to re-cut something or add new details. To some people those hours of making subtle tweaks and changes wouldn’t even be noticed but to me it’s so important that every inch of the design works the best it can and it can be time-consuming – but it will be worth it. I can’t stress this enough to students embarking on their Final Major Projects at the moment! When you know what scale the final artwork will be produced at you need to check the correct level of detail as working at a computer screen can be very misleading for artwork several metres long!

A concept sheet and initial design piece was sent to the client for approval and at this point I had to label the buildings I’d included. Once approved I was able to continue building the full repeat, adding further buildings, and make test prints with the help of the team at the Window Film Company – who I already have award-winning work with! They really know their stuff and several phone calls later to check small details regarding file specifications and production issues resulted in the excitement of samples to sign off, both by me and the client. A couple more proofs for colour matching and scale of design was checked and then we were good to go. Quality is everything when it as your name on it, and making sure that everything about the design is right BEFORE it gets installed is rather important. Sleepless nights before installation of projects has been known!

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This project originally came my way almost a year ago with some scoping phone calls and emails, and now I’m able to share photographs with you. I’ve had people let me know they’ve seen work that looks like mine at the airport – hoping I hadn’t been copied – but no, this time it is mine! When Birmingham Airport tweeted the pictures last week I was delighted that I can now share images of this project from 2018 – when I was Birmingham-based as it states, and now it feels rather a fine farewell to the place I called home since 2005.

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(onsite pictures – official photographs from Birmingham Airport)

Yes it is by the toilets, yes I have already worked on two commissions for public toilets (Colchester / Dedham many moons ago), and I can’t promise this will be my last!

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Plot 8

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This summer has been a funny one for harvest on the allotment. The long period of heat and lack of rain resulted in tiny potatoes and very  late runner beans but somehow despite this, vast marrows! This year of gardening has been rather chaotic, with sparse visits fitted in around our working patterns and family life, but once I’ve made the time and put in the effort to get there I have always really appreciated the head space the plot gives me in a somewhat full-on / stressful academic / design career. An hour of digging is so good for my mind and body, far better than any gym visit. Connecting with nature helps me register the seasons, and home-grown fruit and vegetables are the best!

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This year started off like any other: hoping for bumper crops, trying to stay on top of the weeds, while trying to clear old ground for new patches of earth to cultivate. Then an opportunity arrived and we made a big decision that has been in the back of our minds to make for a while, couldn’t work out how to do it, but is now coming true. We are leaving Birmingham and moving to the country – Norfolk to be precise (yes I was born there, no I’m not going home) – where I am taking up a new academic role, and it’s all-change! Anyone with a sense of British geography knows we will be nearer the sea, we will see more sky, and the horizon will be flatter! We are not moving up or down, we are moving across!

This process has been taking shape over the summer months and during this time I’ve had to come to terms with leaving plot 8, in an allotment site in south Birmingham that I’ve worked so hard on, dug intimately and harvested crops from since 2006. My children have slept in their prams in all weathers as I’ve carried on digging, they’ve chewed on runner beans when teething and learned to grow their own plants too – as well as digging large pits to fill with grass seeds, much to my horror! I’ve dug alongside friendly birds, untangled a hedgehog from the bindweed and been startled by a fox; it’s rarely lonely at the site. I’ll never tire of the first scent of sweet peas each year. Here are a few images from over the years:

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I’ve written many posts here about the plot and the process of growing food, colours, harvests, the community spirit and the way it has inspired my first commercial collection of patterns: Plot to Plate, launched in 2012. I’ve made many editions of prints as a result of mapping the crops growing here. The joys of growing my own food were celebrated in the design featuring tools used on the Plot to Plate title design across tea towels. Without this space – this haven of nature in the big city, I would have struggled far more from living here. As I worked at the allotments I would often think of all the shoppers in the Bullring on a Saturday afternoon, wondering why they made their choice to do so, rather than garden like me.

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This post is written to register the anticipation and excitement of change despite the vast upheaval, both physically and emotionally: saying goodbye to friends and colleagues who have shaped the last 13 years of my life, as well as this plot, that has paid its part in taking care of me. We’ve gathered the tools, taken our last harvest, handed back the keys and now hope that someone else will feel the joy of plot 8 in years to come!

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seeing new things …

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There is nothing like a change of scene to recharge the batteries – here’s a couple of images of near and far sightings from our recent backpacking / camping trip in France, and I plan to write a longer post in due course.

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