My 5 Favourite "Panoramic" Prints

My "Panoramic" sized prints are the response to being asked for longer format images suitable to be used as a focal point or "statement piece" over a mantlepiece or a sofa. 

These prints are 30 x 60 cm  (unmounted size) and are sold window mounted into ivory coloured board for £95. They are also available ready framed here at Crown Studio Gallery. 

1 Beech Woods

 

Northumberland has a number of stands of beautiful beech trees- often where  ancient beech hedges have been partially removed and the once regularly trimmed beeches have been allowed to develop into full sized trees. In other places once-coppiced trees have grown into a dense tracery of multiple trunks and interwoven boughs. Underfoot the woodland floor is as soft and springy as the most luxurious carpet, the multiple layers of shed leaves giving an added bounce to one’s silent footsteps. The iron ochre reds and warm russets of the fallen autumn leaves catch the winter sunlight and sometimes look almost scarlet.  

2 Foxgloves in Summer Sunshine

I’ve painted this stand of trees with their stately foxgloves a number of times, because it looks so different depending on the intensity and direction of the light. In this diffused summer sunshine, it has a drowsy, dream like air, confirming it in my mind as the perfect setting for Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream”.

I’ve always loved the sculptural, almost architectural form of foxgloves. The rigid, upright stems are surrounded by delicate bells of cochineal pink or white, with pale speckled throats and deep inside, as velvety and soft as bubble bees. 

3 Springtime Bluebells

I’ve painted these bluebell woods many times because I love them. When the bluebells are flowering, the trees are just developing their fresh Spring leaves, which are a vibrant, and still translucent, green. This canopy of new leaves allows a soft emerald light to filter through to the ground below, creating a lush, almost magical environment, unlike any other time of the year. Add to this the sight of swathes of azure bluebells with their heady perfume and you have the most wonderful sensory experience.

4 Harbottle, a Coquetdale Village

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The lovely Northumbrian village of Harbottle nestles in the Coquet Valley on the banks of the River Coquet. This view is from the pathway up to The Drakestone, a monumental, flat topped sandstone rock which stands overlooking the valley and which has a longstanding mystical reputation as being a place used by the ancient druids for healing sick children.  This viewpoint shows how the village sits in the fertile Coquetdale landscape, with its now ruined castle still dominating the narrow settlement. The tents are erected ready for Harbottle Show.  

5 Waiting for the Next Leaf to Fall

These trees stand on the steep banks of The River Coquet in Harbottle where it carves its inexorable way behind the castle and village. This was an October day when the leaves had turned an unusually rich variety of oranges, russets, peaches and yellows. As it was very windy I knew that there was a risk of the leaves being ripped from the trees and all those colours disappearing overnight. So I went to sketch and take photos to use to paint from. After a strong gust very nearly pushed me into the river, I decided to work further across the field in the safety of the sun bleached grass.   

My 7 Favourite "Standard" Sized Prints

I have 26 different landscape limited edition prints available here at Crown Studio Gallery- but this is my selection of my favourite 7 "Standard" size prints. All of my prints are  professionally printed using pigment based inks onto an acid free, heavy weight, matt paper to produce a high quality print that can be enjoyed for decades to come.

 “Standard” prints are 28.5 x 35.5 (unmounted size) and are sold window mounted into ivory coloured board. These cost £49 (window mounted) are also available ready framed here at Crown Studio Gallery. 

1 Bluebell Woods

When the bluebells are flowering, the trees are just developing their new Spring leaves, which are a vibrant, and still translucent, green. This canopy of fresh leaves allows a soft emerald light to filter through to the ground below, creating a lush, almost magical environment, unlike any other time of the year. Add to this the sight of swathes of azure bluebells with their heady perfume and you have the most  wonderful sensory experience.
2 Foxgloves

I’ve always loved the sculptural, almost architectural form of foxgloves. The rigid, upright stems are surrounded by delicate bells of pink or white, with pale speckled throats and deep inside, as velvety and soft as bubble bees. These particular foxgloves were a five minute walk from my studio, in a small stand of trees that one might walk past without giving a second glance. But in the summer sunlight it looks like the perfect setting for Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream”.

3 Birches

Birch trees are a great reminder to question your expectations. Far from having monotone trunks in predictable shades of black to white, they can be surprisingly colourful.  Individuals can have young growth as red and shiny as a fairground toffee apple, alongside mature boughs of papery pink, bruised orange and mossy green. Their fine, whiplash branches are a tracery of purple-black. They are beautiful in every season.

4 Elsdon Pele in Autumn Light

I love the contrast in colours created by golden autumnal light washing across the Northumbrian landscape under a bruised and stormy sky. The warm light makes the sandstone buildings seem to glow, transforming the most mundane grey stone into a shimmering new structure.  This is Elsdon Pele Tower, a remnant of Northumberland’s turbulent reiver history.

5 Walking the Dog, Simonside Snow

This is a November view of Rothbury’s River Coquet, with the golf course sitting on the valley’s floodplain and the sloping pattern of fields that crosshatch the valley side, with The Simonside Hills as a backdrop. Dark skeletal trees, hedgerows and fencing are stark against the snow, producing the linear quality and limited palette of a winter landscape.  Only the dog walkers and their dogs have ventured out to enjoy their regular riverside walk.

6 Poppies and Butterflies

Scarlet is an unusual colour for our native flowers, so perhaps that’s why seeing a great splash of them across the landscape is always such a wonderful sight.  Close up they appear to be such a fragile flower, with their tissue paper thin petals and slender wiry stems, but collectively they dominate and subvert the orderly fields of corn where they appear.      

 7 A Summer Stroll on the Banks of the River Coquet

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In summertime Rothbury’s riverside walk is a symphony of greens- from the pale jade of the cut hay fields, to the bottle green conifers on the golf course and emerald plant stems. The rough meadow grass is studded with an ever changing procession of wild flowers from cranesbill to red campion, borage to horse mint, comfrey to devil’s bit scabious and the occasional poppy.

"Made March Hares" and "Happy & Glorious"

Made March Hares window display

It's nearly time to completely change my gallery window display for the summer. My last two window displays, "Made March Hares" and "Happy and  Glorious" were both very well received by my lovely customers, so I've got a lot to live up to. Everyone particularly liked the black and white "Rabbits and Hares" wallpaper I used to paper the base and walls of the window space and to cover the display boxes.  I even had one woman who vowed to come back with a steamer to remove it all for me if only she could keep the paper she removed!  If  only I'd kept her details.......
 

Happy and Glorious Jubilee weekend window display 

I specially designed and sourced some new hare themed pieces for the "Made March Hares" exhibition....

The four completed  Paisley Hare designs

Leaping Paisley Hare in black frame. 

"Moonlit Run"- framed assemblage by Linda Lovatt

A selection of "Happy Hares" 

Due to their popularity, these hare designs will continue to be generally available here at Crown Studio Gallery..

Jubilee window display with Age of Reason Scarf.

For my Jubilee or "Happy and Glorious" window display, I decided on a respectfully tongue in cheek display dominated by this fabulous, British made, "God Save The Queen" pug silk scarf by Age of Reason. "Happy and Glorious" is of course the fifth line of our national anthem, but it could equally describe my own childhood- which began a while after Her Majesty's accession to the throne. So I showed prints from my pen and ink drawings which were inspired by family anecdotes, my own memories and informed by family photographs. They record life in a North East mining town, but also the many changes we have seen as a family and as a nation since the 1950s.

My favourite four drawings.

The final hang of  drawings in chronological order so that they can be "read" as a narrative.

I made several small runs of ceramic commemorative items to mark the Diamond Jubilee.....

My hand painted wall hanging plaques- with lettering by my husband, who has lovely calligraphic writing.  

Vintage style crowns, based on a family heirloom chair back.

The chair back with its naively carved crown, flanked by a pair of lions.

These crowns were created by making a mould directly from this lovely old chair that I inherited from my Granny. It was made in County Durham, probably by a local tradesman, or possibly by my Grandfather for some past Coronation or Jubilee. I won't be creating any more of these special Jubilee items, though I do still have a small number of them in stock here at Crown Studio Gallery.

So now that July is almost here, it's time to say goodbye to the " Rabbit and Hare" wallpaper and hello to the new "Birdcage" paper.... and a new range of bird themed artwork.   

"Perky Puffins"

As a child I once read an Enid Blyton book which included puffins.  I've no idea which book- I devoured them all, despite the disproval of my teacher.... or possibly because it- but perhaps it was "Island of Adventure". No matter.  I was hooked- not on "lashings of ginger beer", but on windswept coasts, dotted with sea pinks and coloufully exotic puffins.  The irony is that living in County Durham I was situated between Northumberland's  Farne Islands and Yorkshire's Flamborough Head, both world famous for their puffin populations- and therefore well placed to visit either. But I kept my wish quietly to myself. So it was only a couple of years ago when I made my first boat trip out to The Farnes during the puffins' nesting period.  It was like walking through the wardrobe into my own private Narnia. Birds nesting so close to the pathways that one could have touched them.  Arctic tern eggs laid right on the path, with only yellow tape to protect them from the feet of  passing strangers. Eider ducks, with jewel eyes and silken plumage nestling in the grass. And the puffin burrows... manned by  these comical, endearing birds like so many tiny, smartly dressed Victorian office clerks, who have been over promoted- so they know that they need to look busy, but aren’t quite sure what they ought to be doing. It was pure, unadulterated magic. 

A selection of puffins- with a variety of ribbons

This then was the inspiration for my new range of ceramic puffins, which I'm calling “Perky Puffins”- though traditional Northumbrian fishermen call the bird a “Tommy Noddy”.

They are available here at Crown Studio Gallery for £10 each and also on my Etsy shop at the same price, but with an additional £2.70 for P&P http://www.etsy.com/shop/lyndataylor3

Made March Hares

As a landscape painter, I realise that I've become increasingly aware of changes in the seasons and weather, which affect what I see in the countryside around me. I'm getting better at anticipating when I'm likely to see a particular flower in bloom or trees losing or gaining their leaves. I know when I can expect to see new lambs- and to expect to have to drive more carefully to avoid their random dashes onto unfenced roads.
I also seem to have developed some Spring rituals of my own...  one of which is to go hare hunting.  Not with a gun of course, but with a patience, binoculars, camera, sketchpad and warm clothing to allow for sitting/standing perfectly still. I have some favourite places to go hare hunting- where I know that if I'm lucky I can get quite close to them without alarming them and causing them to run. I hope you'll excuse me if I don't share the exact whereabouts!

Designing my new series of "Paisley Hares"
In celebration of hares I've seen... and those I hope I'm going to see... my next exhibition is called "Made March Hares" and it features hare inspired jewellery, ceramics and prints, which have been created specially for the occasion. 

Ceramic wall hanging hares after being individually hand painted in underglaze colours- but prior to glaze firing.

Glazed hares.

Made March Hares opens on Tues 28th Feb and runs until Saturday 28th April

Mulled Wine Good Enough to Tempt a Man Off a Mountain!

On Sunday my offer of a warming glass of mulled wine and a mince pie was enough to tempt the blogging sensation that is international travel writer Paul Steele (@paul_steele) and his companion (@cindyvriend) down from the snowy hills above Rothbury.  It also lured in Steve Orrell (@steveorrell) who very kindly took this photograph. So it's obviously powerful stuff. It might not move mountains, but it can evidently move a man... and a woman... off a mountain!! 

If you want to create your own tempting brew, you'll find the recipe in my previous posting.   

Dr Johnson's Favourite

Once Upon a Time many years ago, we discovered this old recipe for mulled wine called "Dr Johnson's Favourite".  (The Dr Johnson in question being Samuel Johnson, the English author, poet and critic whose most memorable contribution to British culture was probably his Dictionary of The English Language published in 1755.)


I thought it had been in an ancient recipe book, given to me by an aged aunt on the occasion of my 14th birthday.... but hunting through my now dilapidated copy I found that this wasn't the case. My husband @pottedhistory AKA Graham Taylor, thought it came out of a long discarded South African magazine. We simply don't know....   But what we DO know is that we've been enjoying this warming, spicy concoction every Christmas for decades and that every time we serve it, people ask for the recipe, which we are always happy to share. By popular demand it was even printed in The Northumberland Gazette one year.


 I don't imagine that there's an historian anywhere who could confirm that this truly was Dr Johnson's Favourite, but I can say for absolute certain that it's OURS. Give it a try, it might just become a favourite of yours too!  


Dr Johnson's Favourite-

1 Bottle red wine

2 Medium orange sliced

1 Sliced lemon

3 Tablespoons of sugar (or to taste)

4 Cloves

1 Mug boiling water

1 Good measure brandy or orange liqueur

Put wine, orange, lemon, sugar and cloves into a stainless or enamelled pan over a low heat.  Bruise the fruit with a wooden spoon to burst the juice cells, cover and heat till steaming but DO NOT BOIL.  Remove from the heat, add boiling water and brandy/liqueur, sieve into a jug, add more sugar if necessary and serve in heat proof glasses.  

It is best taken in congenial company, beside a warm log fire.