DIY City Mag - London Issue

Thanks to Guest Editor Sara who included me and my work in this issue and even on the cover! It features some great crafty places in London & Brighton, and many wonderful artists and designers.

Drawing the City

I've a few new prints coming soon so here's how one of them came about over the course of several days building the scene bit by bit.

I'll be posting the finished piece a little later.

envelope char siu

envelope char siu, originally uploaded by janicejs.

A little bit of my last week on an envelope:

A much needed hairdressers appointment

& a char siu bao (roast pork bun), one of my favourite foods, from a Chinatown bakery my parents used to take me to as a kid. They look a lot more delicious in real-life. : )

Hello again!

Today, in an attempt to shake things up a bit I've put away my usual fine line pens and picked up a homemade bamboo one (carved from bamboo from the garden). I'm enjoying the variety in the thickness of line and that bit of unpredictability.

Creating a scene

drawing in progress, originally uploaded by janicejs.

This is what I've been drawing today. I'm always drawn back to cities and streets, I just find all those random bits of street paraphenalia so fascinating to put together on the paper.

That little bit of something in the top left corner is a test print of my latest nearing completion illustration which I'll reveal later.

Catching up on some reading...

So now I'm a google reader convert. I've just spent almost an hour adding and catching up on those blogs that get lost among my hundreds of bookmarks and I've only just started.

Most days I just about get round to checking out a couple of my favs but there's so much interesting reading that the time just goes.

My head's a little overloaded with the happenings of the blogosphere now so I'll be getting back to my own little world and work. All to a bit of Simon & Garfunkel.

Once upon a time...

The Cinema - Pitfield St., originally uploaded by janicejs.

Browsing through the mass of photos on my computer I came across this. I took it in Hackney earlier this year and turns out it was a cinema. Can't you just imagine it looking all fresh and fancy and being the place to go on an evening back in it's heyday? Or maybe I'm just romanticising it.