The Month Ahead : National Post

Yesterday the National Post had an illustration of mine on the cover of their Arts & Life section! Each month they do an illustration about the month ahead. So I chose skiing and snowboarding for January!
I spent the last 2 weeks in BC (my home province) cramming in as much time cross country and downhill skiing as possible.

This piece was art directed by Daniel DeSouza, who is wonderful to work with.

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays Everyone! Above is an illustration I made of a Toronto Christmas holiday scene. I love the big old converted houses with multiple residences. And the little cafes and great window displays!

I'm in my home town of Nelson BC for my holiday. And I'm loving the mountains! Downhill and cross country skiing is the best!

Hand Knit Gloves

There are two pairs of hand knit, wool, Sanquhar gloves for sale in my Etsy shop. One red/white pair and one black/white pair!

The gloves measure approximately 6 1/2 inches from tip of middle finger to bottom of palm (not including wrist), by approximately 3 3/4 inches width of palm. Measurements are taken from the glove laid flat (not with hand inside). Because it's a knit, the gloves are quite stretchy.

The gloves are knit in the Duke style of the Sanquhar pattern. The wrists have a cute little knitted bow (traditionally the wearers initials would be knit here).

The yarn is a lovely, hand dyed, merino lambs wool from France. The wool company is Renaissance Dying. And they use natural plant based dyes.


These would sure make for a special Christmas gift for a lucky lady in your life ...

WORN Fashion Journal Illustration

The lovely WORN intern, Marsya Maharani, asked me to contribute an illustration to the latest issue of WORN Fashion Journal. I love WORN! So I was very happy to do this. Above is a photo of my process.

Even though the final would be in black and white, due to the nature of my paper cut out style, I used some colour.

And here's the final with the haiku!

The La La Land Digs of Ms. Melody Drummand

Brand new, completed dollhouse illustration!

I'm super pleased to present the latest illustration in my ongoing dollhouse series. I posted about this earlier in relation to Alexis & Sam Music Productions. I have now completed the final details of the piece and an 11 x 17 print is now available in my Etsy store.

It was so fun to create this piece. I wanted to add elements to give that old Hollywood feel. I included the creature from the Black Lagoon, the bones of Jaws and Clint Eastwood on the silver screen. And all the little musical instruments were carefully image researched and cut out. You can find an acoustic guitar, tuba, bass clarinet, 2 electric guitars, violin, banjo, cello, trumpet, piano and alto clarinet.

Now what sort of dollhouse to do next?

R.E.A.L The Canadian Kids Magazine Illustrations

Here's a fun set of illustrations I did for R.E.A.L the Canadian Kids' magazine. It was art directed by Erica Rodriguez and the wonderful poem was written by Kurt Metzler.

Alexis & Sam Music Productions

Alexis & Sam business cards

Alexis & Sam splash page

Fewf! Well this was a big, fun project!

My wonderful and talented friends, Alexis Marsh and Sam Jones, asked me to do a music and film themed dollhouse for her new music production company. The company is based in LA so she wanted an LA themed house. It was fun to do a little image research of California flora and birds (I've included an American Goldfinch, Barn Swallow and Downy Woodpecker). And I managed to cram in 11 musical instruments into the house!

Clothed Matters Art Exhibit

Last Friday was the opening reception to the Clothed Matters art exhibit at Freedom CC Gallery (a non profit Toronto gallery that supports local emerging artists). The theme was "fashion" and was curated by Marsya Maharani.

I have two pieces up, "Emily" and "Let's Go Together". I think they look very lovely framed and hung!

Thanks to everyone who came out to the reception! The show runs till November 11th, so drop by if you can.

Weekend Post Cover Illustration

My illustration is on the cover of the Weekend Post section of the current National Post newspaper! And a crop of the large illustration is reused inside with the article.

The article was about translation and was art directed by Daniel DeSouza. It was a pleasure working with him and we're both very happy with how it turned out.

Tuba Animation Character Design

Well, my good friend and composer, Alexis Marsh, and I have been talking about working together on an animation for years! And now with the amazing work of the director and filmmaker, Jesse Ewles, we're getting our act together!

We have just submitted an animation to get a Bravo Fact animation grant! We have a solid story, storyboards, music samples, character design (by yours truly) and a background pan sketch.

So fingers crossed!

Interval House : Brochure Illustration

Earlier this summer I had the pleasure to create another illustration for Interval House. The illustration was for a brochure about the woman's shelter.

This piece was art directed by John Lepp of Agents of Good!

Advertisment in Juxtapoz Magazine

I finally picked up the August Juxtapoz magazine that has my Fluevog shoe ad in it! I hope to be in Juxtapoz again in the future, but maybe in an article instead of an ad.

"Like Birds Too Tired To Fly" Makes The Papers

Shawn Clarke's album, Like Birds To Tired To Fly, has been reviewed in Toronto's NOW Magazine this week! He got 4 out of 5 stars and the write up is wonderful. I was also very excited to see the album art was included in the article.

Congratulations Shawn!

TIME Magazine : The Best of Asia

I came back from my Beautiful British Columbia vacation to find a copy of TIME magazine with my illustration on page 20! May Wong, the art director I worked with, was so wonderful.

The piece was for a write up about a spa that uses ingredients found in a Bloody Mary in their treatments. The half page illustration has the feel of the old pin-up girl in a martini theme, but with a more relaxing, spa type spin.

Fluevog Creative Winner!

Thanks to all my wonderful friends, family and fans of my art, I was voted in as the newest Fluevog Creative Winner!

You can now find a nice interview I gave about my art and my process on the Fluevog website. I'm very excited that the add with be in magazines like Juxtapos, Bust and Ready-Made!

Fluevog Creative Finalist

My shoe ad was selected as a finalist in the Fluevog Creative competition! My sister, Kristy, told me it kind of looks like Dorothy clicking her red heels and coming home.

Be sure to vote for my submission everyday and help me win!

Poster Art : three

I've wrapped up the final art and design for Shawn Clarke's CD Release poster! I wanted it to have a similar feel to the CD but with brand new art. I included the Blue Tit, perched on the arrow (similar to the CD cover art). On the right hand side is a Ceder Waxwing and some little brown birds.

Poster art will be available, in a limited quantity, at the show. So if you live in Toronto, come on out to C'est What on June 11th!

Hope Takes Root

Here's my new submission to the Fluevog ad competition. This shoe is made with a bamboo heel, so to play that up, I wanted to give the feel of them growing out of a garden. These shoes are being advertised as environmentally concious, and giving hope, so I wanted to include the word in the illustration. I thought it was cute to do it with the worm tunnel.

Earth Day

I thought this illustration of Miss Fawn Cuttington's Rustic A-Frame was fitting on a day devoted to nature. I had fun doing the garden with the lettus, carrots, corn and spinach.

There's prints of it for sale here.


And here's a picture of my own little tomato grow opp. There's two types of cherry tomatoes! And I'm very excited about them. The long stemmed plant in the front is an avocado, but it can't seem to keep it's leaves.

Happy Earth Day!

Poster Art : two

Here's a photo of the progression of the poster! This is just a crop .. but you can see the archer, the flora, and the little brown birds.

Like Birds Too Tired To Fly : Printed CD

CD's! It's always exciting to see the finished products. Shawn and I are both thrilled with the outcome.

Shawn Clarke : Like Birds Too Tired To Fly

CD Booklet, outside

CD Booklet, inside

It was my huge pleasure to illustrate and design my good friend, Shawn Clarke's, new album. He pretty well let me do whatever I liked. His only request was for me to use blue, keep it a bit graphic and to have a bird (not flying) on the cover.

I'm completely thrilled with the out come!

We are anxiously awaiting the return of the CD from the printer today. I'll do another post with photos of the finished product.

Poster Art : one

New illustration project! This is a little piece of a poster I'm making for the talented musician, Shawn Clarke, for his up coming CD release.

More to follow ...

Stamping Out The Devil!

I enjoy submitting to competitions now and then. It gives me a chance to do something new and challenging.
This is the latest Fluevog ad I've submitted to their ongoing Fluevog Creative competition. I wanted to show the boots sturdy attributes. So I illustrated it stomping out the devil / splashing through a puddle. I used the outer glow to give that angelic / impervious feel.

My very talented boyfriend, Jesse, helped me with the sizing, placement and text design.

I've owned 4 pairs of Fluevogs so far. I went to my prom in the the Wok 'n' Roll wooden sandals and I am currently in love with my almond toed Alyssa Flats.

Fan Art for Emily Martin

I'm a big fan of the fashion blog of the very talented painter, Emily Martin, Some Girls Wander. She has such a great style, sometimes whimsical sometimes secretary and always lovely. I made this paper cut illustration based on one of her dayly outfit photos. I loved the flower pins and she described them as a garden, so I wanted her to be in a patch of garden, as if she herself was a flower that poped out of the ground.

Well it was a lot of fun to make! I think I'll be doing more fan art in the future.

Interval House Gratitude Report : In Print!

Yesterday I made a trip to Interval House to deliver the framed original illustration I made for their Gratitude Report. While I was there, Ashleigh Saith (the Resource Development Coordinator) gave me a tour of the building.

Before I left, she gave me a copy of the printed report and a postcard promotion. It's always very exciting to see my work in print! The beautiful design is by John Lepp

Alexis Marsh CD Package Design

My exceptionally talented composer friend, Alexis Marsh, asked me to design her a new CD promotional to pass out to studios in LA. We talked about what she wanted, and she mentioned that she wanted a little bit of old Hollywood glamour and just generally something beautiful.

I went to the library and looked up Vaudeville and found some really great images of girls in sequined little outfits and kind of ran with it. Instead of putting in musical instruments, I put in a bird head (I felt that suggested music enough). The branches are pretty little design accents and they tied in Canada evergreen trees (where Alexis is born) and California palms (where she is currently living).