Instant Download Orange Nasturtium by acabinetofcuriositie on Etsy

Stormy weather here and the large Monterey Pine cones from the huge tree at Heddons Mouth are scattered on the ground - they can stay attached to the tree for over 30 years which is quite remarkable! The intricate overlapping spiral patterns in the cone (which follow the Fibonacci series) are difficult to count and tricky to draw, because it's just so easy to lose sight of where you are on the clockwise spiral and then having to continually cross check that you are still in line with the…

Jeannie Foord Decorative Plant and Flower Studies 1901, Pochoir Flower Prints

Original antique prints, engravings, maps, lithographs, woodcuts, globes and frames created between the 16th and 19th centuries.

Jeannie Foord Decorative Plant and Flower Studies 1901, Pochoir Flower Prints

Floral notes, pressed petals, likes, loves, the occasional greyhound. Sorry, not really a chatty blog. Don't feel obliged to 'follow' me because you 'like' or re-blog my posts. However, please retain...

Jeannie Foord Decorative Plant and Flower Studies 1901, Pochoir Flower Prints

Cornflowers are a very unique blue, looking them up I discovered why! "The ions that bind in cornflower blue Roses are red and cornflowers are blue, but both flowers are coloured by the same red pigment. This conundrum has puzzled people for 90 years, but finally scientists have worked out what makes cornflowers blue, publishing their findings in Nature. Kosaku Takeda of Tokyo Gakugei University in Japan, and colleagues, used x-ray diffraction to investigate the structure of the cornflower…

It's been a while! When I was teaching a short course in textile design at West Dean College last week, one of the students very kindly brought me in a small branch from her Ginkgo Biloba tree because I'd mentioned that I had always wanted to draw it. So there was nothing to be done but make time this weekend to draw a few leaves and document their beautiful colours for a bit of brain therapy... Colours from the top: Leaf green; leaf stalk yellow; fruit green; young fruit blue/green; branch…

In winter once the leaves have all fallen, you can see the Mistletoe hanging in ethereal almost perfectly circular balls from the branches. ...

I've been waiting patiently throughout the winter to note the colours and fascinating form of this plant. Just as I was planning to draw it last year, it stopped flowering and then went into total hibernation, at which point I thought I'd killed it (my house plants often only thrive if they're near the sink). But then, suddenly, about a month ago it started to re-emerge. The leaves open and close like an umbrella, reminding me of an inspiring Issey Miyake pleats creation. The young leaves…

gorse flower - Google Search

A textile designers sketchbook of seasonal colour, textile design and pattern repeat.

sampickarddesign.blogspot.com - captures the somewhat elusive rowan berry red (kind of a berry-red with a little orange)

Uh-oh, I'd fully intended to compose November's colours in November and now December has barged in and Christmas is only a few weeks away! So here, tardily, are a select three of my November favourites - New Zealand Flax and its muted Art Nouveau palette; waving madly and adding vintage winter shades the pods and berries of the Stinking Iris, leading to a prickly end with the silver, grey and yellow ochre of the Carline Thistle... I've had my eye on some pretty extra-ordinary hips for a few…