Snug like two beans in cocoa pod.

I’ve been back at the windows of Cocoa Amore leading up to the great celebration of Saint Valentine; patron saint of affianced couples, guarding against fainting, bee keepers, happy marriages, love, plague, and epilepsy.

I didn’t include any bees or plague as that might have confused the message, but I did keep it simple and bright with an explosion of little none-cutesy hearts bursting from the Cocoa Amore logo, which itself is pretty darned heart-shaped. I made some of the cocoa beans romantic colours too (is purple romantic? Steady…)

Then it was just a case of sprinkling them around the windows to reflect the overall sense of adoration and longing (for chocolate, of course).

cocoa-amore.co.uk

 

Christmas Trees at Cocoa Amore.

 
It’s such hard work, drawing to the smell of liquid chocolate and constantly being offered hot chocolate, sweet things ‘to see what I think of them’ and nice strong coffee. But you know what they say, somebody’s got to do it.

Christmas at Cocoa Amore is of course a stupidly busy time, and as this was Pete’s first one in the new building, its big Victorian windows needed something extravagant to announce the arrival of the biggest sales season of the year, so were created a little bit at a time in an anticipatory fashion. Hallowe’en was well and truly over, and the windows clean again ready for the next season.

Cocoa Amore is a chocolate boutique for grown-ups, I fancied no Santas nor presents but a winter forest, where the chocolate things dangle tantalisingly from frozen branches in a deafeningly-quiet clearing; all you would be able to hear, were you actually there, is the crunching of fresh snow underfoot and the occasional creak of branch as someone reaches for a chocolate bauble. The stars (if we could look up) would be clear and plentiful. And perhaps there were some things hiding inside the trees that may or may not look out occasionally to serve you chocolate!

Just as Leicester was setting up its Christmas ferris wheel and accompanying city celebrations, I began working on the two trees. With a previous piece of work in mind - Snowtrees, from a story written by Ed Garland - the Cocoa Amore committee - Pete, Alun, Leigh and Me) decided that it should start snowing first, so that the design developed over the weeks from the top:

followed by the toppermost branches of the trees:

and went back a few days later to work downwards…

On successive visits the trees were hung with be-ribboned chocolate ornaments, some painted with gold:

and other baubles were painted on:

Late night working of course requires sustenance, this being the richest source of carbs and fat to be foraged in the immediate environment:

And after three weeks of as many night shifts as I could fit in, the window is complete!

And this is Podrick, named by the owner and hanging proudly in the centre of the window above the logo in his Christmas ribbon:

Pete went on to add three strings of fairy lights (that’s Pete on the right in the grey jumper) which really brought the final twinkling magic, and lit up the forest floor!

I will be back there soon to begin the Valentine process.

http://www.cocoa-amore.co.uk

It Takes A Nation Of Hairdressers.

In Sunday we painted the windows of our friends' Katie and Tom's Aveda salon. It was partly because they have big empty windows, because it's ages since I did anything large-scale, and because they said we could!

'We' was Me and Tiffany Hurlston, who I invited to draw on one of the windows while I did the other. Having to create a pair of illustrations which complemented each other without compromising our respective styles was easier than first thought, because even though I work in ink lines and she likes to draw in pencil, the common denominator was a life-long love of drawing 'pretty ladies' and flowing healthy hair. And what else could a salon wish for on their windows?

First came the rough - here's my Photoshop sketch where I've traced Tiffany's drawing (left as you look at it) and my spontaneous sketch on the right.

  

This was approved by Tom and Katie, then we lent Tiffany one of our walls to practise working at a large scale for the first time:

I drew some ideas in a sketchbook but abandoned the mopey fringe, the spaced-out curls and and Rihanna-esque sulkfest for a serene Art Nouveau side profile:

When this didn't really mirror Tiffany's haughty-couture lady, a re-draw of the original wind-blown sketch was made with Aveda's herbal ingredients skittering through her hair in the autumn wind:

We put our drawings onto acetates so that they could be projected from inside and the guidelines followed (less used to freestyling, Tiffany was more comfortable using a guide for her first large-scale piece - I followed suit to get eyes, nose and chin in the right spot).

On site, we covered the windows with lining paper to enable projection and keep nosy eyeballs from seeing what was happening. Projecting wasn't the most brilliant idea, but for this job was the safest in ensuring a good result in the tight time available (an afternoon!)

Painting commenced.

Then we ripped off all of the paper to reveal...

And I knitted the two pieces together with a hand-drawn salon welcome (which had to be written backwards of course):

Tom and Katie with their faces of approval!

And this is how it looks from the street: