I Love Liberty

I was in London for a few special reasons (more of which later) but whilst I was there I went to one of my favourite shops...Liberty! enjoy!

Who Needs Sleeves?

yes capes are an ongoing obsession.....

I just finished illustrating a cape for Oh Comely Magazine.....you'll have to wait till the magazines out before I can show you the whole image...

also was very excited to find some other magic capes by Shida Tatsuya on the online store Koshka. I love the geometric and the sparkly cape....who needs sleeves anyway?

Queen of Tea and Biscuits

I got the most wonderful surprise parcel today. It was addressed with a seal proclaiming 'For Queen Lesley' and contained a very important Royal portrait (and not of Wills and Kate.....) The rather special Gaia Bordicchia (AKA Countess of Coffee and Cake) had drawn a portrait (entirely accurate) of me for Christmas entitled 'Lesley Queen of Tea and Biscuits' So now you know - blue blood flows through my veins (probably mixed with biscuit crumbs and tea...)

In other news I also bought myself a rather wonderful vintage cape (take a peek here)

The ace Aqua Velvet wrote a wee bit about me on her blog

Postcards.....and a wee giveaway!

I LOVE postcards and I have a huge drawer full of them - they also fill every available shelf and space on my wall! Here's a few lovely postcards I recieved recently from some of my favourite illustrators (and people)
top left - a super christmas post card by the amazing Anke Weckmann
bottom middle - you can pick one of the top Thereza Rowe's postcards at your local cinema as she designed the promo material for 'The Thorn in the Heart' by Michel Gondry.
bottom right and left - The lovely Yelena Bryksenkova sent me some of her postcard sized ladies.

and a wee giveaway! Amelia sent me a stack of postcards with my Christopher Raeburn image from her new book (You can read my blog about it here) I will pick three from any comments left below and send them one of these postcards!

Amelia's Compendium of Fashion Illustration

As you saw from my new year bookshelf I was lucky enough to receive my contributors copy of Amelia's Compendium of Fashion Illustration...so I thought I would show you some of my pages! The book was written, art directed and designed by the ever super Amelia Gregory. It brought together 30 illustrators and a whole host of the best ethical fashion designers
I illustrated the quirky Lu Flux, the beautiful kimono shoes of Hetty Rose, the jewellery of Little Glass Clementine, and some Christopher Raeburn pieces. I also designed the text for the cover (which was illustrated by Andrea Peterson)

There are some amazing illustrators featured in the book whose work you should check out (but ALL the illustrations and illustrators are ace!) Some of my favourites include the romantic illustrations of Andrea Peterson, the psychedelic Natsuki Otani, the striking colour splash of Bex Glover, the paper queen Erica Sharp and the quite simply wonderful Yelena Bryksenkova (check out the elephant on her site!)

Wanna buy it now? You can here

and you can see more images on my website

New Year Bookshelf

Happy 2011! Here's the pile of books I acquired over the festive period.....

Charley Harpers 123s AMMO (£2 from the habitat sale)

Charley Harpers ABCs AMMO (£2 in the habitat sale)

A Graphic Cosmogony NoBrow Press (a gift)

Amelia's Compendium of Fashion illustration Amelia's House (my contributors copy)

Penguin 75 Penguin Books (a gift)

Born Modern - The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig Chronical Books (a gift to myself!)