new stockist

my work is now available at Koukoutsi, on Skoufa 81, Athens. They'll be stocking a collection of my paper goods, including cards and postcards as well as some of my new Greek pins- you have to go by the shop to be the first to see those.

I love their modern greek themes, so happy to have found a great home for my Hello Greece postcards!

lost birds

I have a couple of new items, that I've been working on for quite awhile now, so I'm pretty excited they're finished at last. Both relate to my extinct birds series. The first is a new colouring book / zine, which features a page each on 30 different extinct birds, and a small piece of each bird's story.

 

the second item is a pairs / memory card game, again featuring my extinct birds. This set comes with 50 cards, so that's 25 bird pairs. 

Both these are printed on recycled paper of course, and are available in my Etsy shop.

somehow it is nearly november, so christmas things are available again in my Etsy shop, including my new card design for this year, red doves. if you're shopping from outside europe for something for christmas, I highly recommend placing your order before the end of november to give your package plenty of time to reach you before december 25th.

if you're in athens, I'll be at the christmas meet market, which will be saturday and sunday 8&9th of december at technopolis. More details closer to the date!

 

my new print is finished- this one, Makambo, is part of my series on australian imagery and stories. I came across this story while looking into my other series on extinct birds. the SS Makambo was a steamship that ran aground off Lord Howe Island, Australia in 1918. In the time it took for the ship to be repaired and refloated, black rats were able to come ashore. The rats were the direct cause of the extinction of five bird species and sub species that were found only on the island. 

This print features the five birds, the Lord Howe Gerygone, the Lord Howe Island Thrush, the Lord Howe Starling, the Lord Howe Fantail and the Robust White Eye, along with some of the plant species native to the island.

here is how the birds start out, and below, the Makambo. Obviously I am not someone who draws boats, so it didn't make the final! The print is available now in my Etsy shop.

lastly, I had to share this lovely coin purse made by one of my customers, Nina, with some of my australiana series prints. So pretty! thanks for sending me the image!

 

the first sketches have been made for my next print in my australiana series, this one is is based on a story I learned of while researching my extinct birds series, so there is a bit of a cross over. five bird species/sub species becoming extinct because of a ship hitting a reef, rather tragic. this one is destined to become a gocco print, at first at least, and hopefully I'll get that ready in the next week or two.

 

more on the extinct birds series, my passenger pigeon fabric is available at last, I'm really pleased with how it's tuned out! I have it now in my Etsy shop.

my fabric collection is getting pretty big, so I'm not going to be able to keep every design in stock, I'm putting images of all my designs into my flickr page, so if you are interested in past designs you can check it out. If you want one I don't have in stock, then just email me and I can order it printed for you.

 

it seems the shops who stock some of my work are preparing for Christmas, as I had a couple of wholesale orders come in... here they are ready to be boxed up and sent. I suppose that means I need to get my shop ready to!

extinct birds

another project on the go, is my series on extinct birds. some of the birds, almost nothing is known and most of my drawings are based on plates made from birds collected and described by naturalist explorers in the 1800s. in some cases I was able to look at specimens collected and now in museums. if you're able, the Natural History Museum in Paris has a hall filled with specimens of the worlds extinct animals, and is well worth a visit.
I think it's nice to remember the birds we lost, the world was a very different place once upon a time, and not so long ago really.

there are a few different products I'm working on in this series, a few still in progress, but I have finished two new pins to add to my extinct bird pin collection, the moho apicalis, formerly of Hawaii and the passenger pigeon of North America. for the whole collection of my extinct bird pins, check my Etsy shop here. check back over the next month or so as I hope to have some of the new products ready soon.

so I know it's been ages since my last post, I thought it was about time I showed some of the new things I've been working on. among other things, I'm working on a series at the moment based on australian stories and places. I started off wanting to do illustrations for each state, featuring each state's floral emblem, animal, and bird, but this wasn't enough imagery, and not really terribly interesting, so I started thinking of places with stories that went with them.


The first theme I went with was the Snowy River, a river flowing through the east of Australia, and the setting for one of Australia's most famous poems, The Man From Snowy River. This design features the plants and animals native to the region, along with a wild horse, or brumby, the subject of the poem.


the second design, I've called An Exact Observer, and is based on the travels of William Dampier, one of the first Englishmen to set foot in Australia. While he was not a naturalist or botanist (in fact he was for some of his career a pirate) he had the curiosity to collect and describe the plants and animals he encountered, and his become the first published drawings of Australian plants and animals.

the images in this print depict the flora and fauna he described and collected as he traveled along the coast of Western Australia.

lastly I have the Swan River Colony, the name given to the first English settlement in what is today Western Australia. As my home state, I have some fondness. The animals and plants here include the black swan, numbat, banksia, kangaroo paw and quokka among others.

I like working in groups of six, so I have a few more designs planned, two somewhat related to poor navigation and another an ode to Australia's most well known botanist.

You can find the currently available designs, some printed fabrics and screen prints, here in my Etsy shop.