Favourite old course / new venue

I’m so happy to say that I’m going to start running Painting & Drawing Flowers at Winterbourne House & Gardens. This is a class that I have developed and run for a few years and now it has a new, super inspiring home.

What better place to find beautiful flowers, plants and leaves to draw and paint.

Just being in the grounds is going to be inspiring and we will work outside when we can and in the studio at other times.

It’s a class designed for everyone at whatever level of experience you may be – I’m a great believer in the emphasis being on enjoyment not output so just come along and have fun being creative.

The first block of classes is up for sale here each Tuesday from 10.30-12.30, June 6th – July 11th 2023. Then another block will run in October/November time.

£125 for all six 2 hour classes (inc your entry fee) come for coffee and leave for lunch and enjoy the garden all day.

We will use charcoal, pencil, watercolours, acrylics, chalk & oil pastels as we study plants in real life and works by past and contemporary artists.

And we’ve kept the course cost low by you supplying your own materials – you’ll mostly need to buy paper and I’ll have some bits available to use each week – it won’t be an extensive material list, promise.

You can book here.

Garden Birds

I began this new year wanting a fresh personal project to work on and wanting to *play* a bit in my work and just follow inspiration where it led me.

That feeling also coincided with a growing interest in being able to name the birds that frequent my garden and also the purchase of a pair of binoculars.

A few months later on and I have completed my very own book of garden birds.

I dug out a few of my favourite vintage bird books for both good information and great reference pictures.

And I studied up before I began painting each feathered friend. Once you’re not in education, its easy to forget the gains from reading up and learning.

Over some months, in and amongst other work and things going on, I compiled some illustrations of birds – the only pre-requisite being that I included only birds that I’ve seen in my garden. The Jay and the Woodpecker have stopped for a nosey but not often or for very long.

I once had the magical experience of actually watching momma Wren fledge her chicks out of the nest in our hedge and chase them down the garden willing them to fly for the first time.

I had already decided to bind these paintings into a book format and so I set up the pages with that in mind.

I decided to hand write all the information pages and keep the true handmade feel through and through. I painted an abstract leaf pattern for the cover and set to putting it all together with glue and waxed string.

And I’m delighted with it in so many ways – I can use my own work to reference and teach myself and there’s something so scrummy about a handmade book which also makes a perfect place to keep a body of work intact.

If you’d like to see all the birds and the films I made of making the book and the book itself, then head over to either Instagram here or Facebook here

Original watercolours sale

I have completed a little body of work from my Hebrides trip this year. If you would like a piece they are all listed below in order of size, with prices and UK postage included – postage will be worked out for any sales abroad once you have emailed the destination.

Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk and I will send payment details 🙂 Thank you x

BALRANALD 10cm x 7.5 cm watercolour on watercolour board £15 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

FIELD 10cm x 7.5 cm watercolour on watercolour board £15 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

DUBH-LOCHAN 10cm x 7.5 cm watercolour on watercolour board £15 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

PORTREE, SKYE 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

THE BRAES, SKYE 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

AHMORE, UIST 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

LOCH MADDY. SOLD 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

LOCH MASSAIG. 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

SOUTH UIST 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

UIST INTERIOR 1 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

UP TO LOCH MAASAIG 6×4″ watercolour on watercolour paper £20 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

SEILEBOST 10.5 x 27.5 cm. watercolour on watercolour paper £30 in UK p&p.
Please email me at hello@claireleggett.co.uk with the painting title as the email subject.

Hebrides painting work

As the year draws to an end, I’ve found it has galvanised me to complete the body of paintings I have been working on ever since we visited The Hebrides back in April.

I have been steadily working away filling a sketchbook and creating ideas for future pattern designs in-between all the other things I also do. I find I like to nest a bit on my work before sharing it and now I find I have a lot to show.

The thing that caught my painters eye the most in The Hebrides were the patterns these little pieces of land make as they are cut through by waterways and creeks. I have enjoyed painting them over & over. I love the way the horizon blends in as the water is reflected in the sky 

I have also played around with granulating medium recently. This salt-marsh painting in Leverburgh was perfect for it. Granulating medium separates the pigment and binder allowing the colour to settle onto the surface of the paper making lots of texture,

I’m gearing up to have a little sale of some of these pieces – so watch this space if you’re interested, Claire x

Outer Hebrides painting work in progress

I have been working my way through the wealth of inspiration I found since returning from our 3 week adventure around some of the islands of the Outer Hebrides.

There was so much colour, texture and mood to capture.

I did try to work on site but found either the rain or the cramped cab conditions in the camper van a real challenge.

So most of my work has been done from photographs and sketchy sketches back home in the studio where conditions can be controlled!

I loved the colour palette of the Uist islands the best from all the islands we visited (I did a little write up of that in a previous post somewhere) – peaty brown, pink and burgundy – yum.

The beaches are legendary and with good reason too.

Lots of cloud and sky with beautiful delicate hues and fluffly clouds. Sometimes the weather changes very quickly and so stormy indigo blue clouds can roll in very quickly.

All of which makes this watercolour painter very happy.

3/3. 100dayproject

Made it!

Wow, that was a marathon adventure and like all good runners, towards then end I had to slow down rather than just stop and call it quits.

But like all things, its when you’re stretched and challenged that growth occurs.

The daily (or technically I should say sustained) practice of showing up to paint has indeed kept me creative and accountable for doing so.

And I have found that my muscle memory and my hand eye co-ordination has improved and that I’m as surprised as anyone when I can capture a plant in a few strokes of a brush and with a limited colour range.

In short, practice makes you better at looking and capturing.

Which shouldn’t surprise me really.

We know if we exercise that our muscles become stronger but probably don’t talk much in those terms of the process of practising creatively.

And we should, because it does work the same way.

I have thoroughly enjoyed naming the plants in my garden – many of which I have inherited from the previous owners or Mother Nature.

And I have a unexpected sense of satisfaction to have two books full of catalogued plant names.

But I am glad it’s finished now and as the season winds down I won’t have the challenge of finding something new to include.

With hindsight 100 was a lot and maybe 75 would have suited me just enough.

So when I calculated that there were only enough pages in the book for 96 I took that as a divine compromise 😉

100 days

On June 1st I decided I’d commit to doing a 100days project. There were a few reasons for this:

For Christmas I got given a seed advent calendar which has been a lot of fun but also a lot of work – 25 different kinds of annuals to grow has kept me on my toes in the greenhouse. But it also means I have a lot of lovely plants to enjoy.

I had also enjoyed my residency at Winterbourne H&G so much that I had decided to try and document my own garden in a similar matter. However as is often the case when things are at home, it seems harder to paint and draw in my own garden. I have found time to do some studies and textile work but it doesn’t document the changes as I’d hoped because I can’t keep up the frequency of work needed.

Lastly, I’m back working at MAC (hurrah) and when I’m focussing on delivery I often find my own creativity takes a backseat.

So for all those reasons I started 100days of drawing/painting something in my own garden.

It doesn’t need to be finished or good and it can be quick or slow and I’m also finding I automatically apply several styles to my work but I’m not over-thinking it – just doing it, noticing and letting it be whatever it is.

Here’s the first six days.

Picking & painting

The garden still has some treasures to be found worth painting – I have left flowers to go to seed so that there are interesting seed heads, the ornamental quince has fruited and the Marigolds soldier on regardless and all of these make lovely things to paint on this sunny day.

Orchid, Horse and Butterfly

I can never pass up on the opportunity to buy a cheap orchid when I’m at Ikea.

This time they had these miniature ones which are the perfect size for a still life painting.

I was going for a more tonal approach with this set up…jury’s out on this one!

Orchid, Horse and Butterfly © Claire Leggett

Ranunculus and Bluebells

In between rain showers I have picked around the edges of the garden finding the odd lovely flower here and there.

One one flower on the candelabra Primula, only three ranunculus blooms that were uneaten by creatures and a couple of bluebells because I already know how hard they are to paint!

I added some spots and stripes and it came together by itself.

© Claire Leggett Ranunculus and Bluebells

This painting and all my others and more besides will be with me at Patchings Festival beginning this Thursday – if you’re on Flickr you can watch the festival progress here and if you are visiting do come and say hi.