Hand held windmills and the salty seaside breeze

I've been busy preparing for my show this week and sorting out the last few finishing details. I needed a sign for my little rock promo giveaways and I thought making a windmill would be a far more fun alternative. I made one with my donkey design on it and took it down to the beach to photograph. I was really surprised that it worked in the breeze... the only problem was waiting for the wind to ease while I took a quick photo!

As a child I loved watching these little windmills spin wildly in the salty seaside breeze and I still love them now. For me they bring to mind carefree, happy childhood days at the beach.

Oh, I do like to stroll upon the prom!

This is a stitched collage piece that was inspired by the seafront here at Southsea. I've always had a fascination with the coloured lights that adorn our British coastal resorts. No matter what the weather, here on the British coastline, you'll always find people strolling along the prom, prom prom...

Designing postcards

I have been busy designing postcards from my original stitched images...

I've also designed some packaging for the postcards...

 Set of 6 postcards with brown card envelope

Packaging for my postcards

Designing an alternative style of packaging for my postcards

Designing postcard envelopes

String tie envelopes for my postcards

I have been experimenting with designing envelopes for some postcards based on my project designs. 

The backs of the tie string envelopes

Another boxed design

Seaside themed cushions

My cushion designs

I've been making cushions with prints of my seaside images.

The back of the cushions

I finished the cushions with some colourful buttons and pom pom trim. Then I made some labels using my buckets and spades design.

My deckchair design

There are so many deckchair designs available now and seaside ones are traditionally stripy.

I couldn't do a project on the British seaside without including a deckchair - so here is my design- I hope you like it.

The Lido

Lido bather

The Lido was an invention of the 1930s. With fountains, slides, cafe's sunbathing decks and spectator terraces, the Lido's were all about the fun of the seaside and were as much about entertainment as they were about swimming. Seaside towns built these modernist facilities to attract tourists as swimming was seen as health-giving and restoring and sunbathing was good for you.

This illustration was inspired by a group of early morning swimmers who I interviewed as part of my research. They group swim in the water whatever the weather -with no wet suits -just a costume and hat!