Genova

We spent a lovely few days relaxing in Genova, this week. The weather was warm and perfect for strolling around in the evenings by the harbour. 

Genova is a small town in northern Italy with few English-speakers, so we got to practice our rolling Rrrrs lots. We also went on the double-decker train to Sestri Levante,  a pretty beach resort and visited the Aquarium - one of Europe's largest apparently. 

The photo at the top demonstrates the amazing 3D paint effects many Genovese buildings are decorated with to look like dressed stone. I found them fascinating.

So back to Blighty, and to work, but first a long weekend to recover... Hope you're having a happy summer.

Kettle brooches

I managed to get a couple of hours on the laser cutter last week and made these new kettle brooches. Available in the shop in red and soft white for now, but I have just received a package of turquoise perspex - so who knows what might appear soon!

New Designers

Hello! What a long gap that turned out to be... 

My classmates and I had an amazing time at New Designers in London at the beginning of July - I can't believe how quickly the last few weeks have gone. It seems only yesterday that I stayed with family in Islington. It was so much fun, I had a gorgeous ten-minute stroll to the exhibition centre each morning, so was very spoilt.

I'm now working at The Fitzwilliam Museum and interning at The District which is keeping me pretty busy. I really need to do some new work of my own though. Any tips for a jump-start? I'm thinking of doing some book covers as a nice exercise. What have you read and enjoyed lately?

Hope you're all enjoying a bit of a summer break. We just booked a cheap holiday here for the end of August - are you jealous? I'm going to eat my own weight in olives!

Look after the pennies

I found this lovely little elephant bank at a car boot sale today. I've always wanted a Carlton ware moneybox but they're a bit out of my price range, so this was rather exciting. We're going to use it to save up for something special.

Good things!

This week the results of the YCN's Student Awards were announced and I was commended for my entry! My classmate Dom was also commended for his work on the Open University brief, so we'll both be off to the ceremony in London in September where (I think) an overall winner of each category is announced - correct me if I'm wrong on that. Last year's event looked great!

New Website

Get your bookmarks ready, I have a new professional website for my Illustration!

www.annabetts.com

Degree Show

Last night was our Degree Show private view, and it was great. This last fortnight had been so stressful getting everything set up, painting boards, printing work, mounting, making special envelope boxes for 150 sets of postcards etc etc. So to see it all finished and everyone dressed up was lovely. We even borrowed a RNIB collection dog from the chaps at The District which we re-labelled for our purposes, to raise money for Van-hire to London for New Designers! It certainly added something to the show...

And the Winner is.....

...the wonderful Darryl Joel Berger from red-handed! Congratulations! Do send me your address and I'll send it. Thanks so much for everyone who commented, I'll have to do more of these...

200th Etsy sale Giveaway!

Yippee! Today I hit my 200th Etsy sale, and to celebrate I'll be giving away one of my unique paper collages. They're made from mostly vintage paper cut into diamond shapes and mounted onto fresh white card measuring 8x10". To enter leave a comment below and I'll draw the winner on Monday at noon UK time. Good luck! And thanks to all of you who've bought from my little shop over the past couple of years, it's truly appreciated.

Last-minute panic

The degree show is just around the corner and the fear is starting to set in. Faced with a rather large hole in my exhibition, I've been working on a new (or rather old) article from a winter edition of Elle Deco from Lucie's impressive archives. This was a bit of a new challenge as the article required three illustrations, and was quite light-hearted and called for something decorative. I certainly enjoyed it though, getting back into cutting paper. What do you think?

Flowerpress Brooch Swap

I'm taking part in Flowerpress' brooch swap so I've been seeking inspiration and putting together some clues for the person making a brooch for me. I've got til 21st June to come up with something, how exciting! Are any of you lovely lot involved?

Anonymous no more

This week I worked on an article about the internet and the increasing likelihood that we will be identifiable by the sites we visit.

I've started to notice it myself lately. I once went on the Habitat website to look at sofas and rugs and for a few months now an advert for a particular rug I looked at has appeared repeatedly in sponsored advert panes in third party websites. Does that seem strange? 

In other exciting news, I'm having a website of my own made this week! But, I won't try and steal your identity or anything if you visit it. I promise.

It's the future!

This afternoon I finished this editorial about 3-D printing, which is the craziest thing I've ever heard of. 

In a few years time, according to some, we will all be able to download and manufacture anything from clothes to body parts on 3-D "additive manufacturing" machines - just like using a home printer. The machines work by building layer upon layer of atoms of a certain material according to a minutely-detailed design. It sounds a little far-fetched but imagine the possibilities! I wonder what it will mean for sites like Etsy, and for the future of "handmade"! Exciting stuff.

PS - Do you like my box kite?

PPS - I just realised how girly the colours are in my illustration, which is for a GQ article. Whoops. Do I change it?

Bacteria... yum.

This week I've been working on a really tricky article about "Bioleaching", an increasingly used method of extracting rare earth metals from low-grade ore with the use of rock-eating bacteria. Delicious.

I really struggled with this one and for some reason I can't get the colours to pop on blogger like they do in the original, but trust me it's a much livelier orange and turquoise combo. Now, on to an article about 3-D printing. Erk.

I'm making a satchel

cardboard templates 

drawing out the pieces

 

two layers for base of bag, saddle-stitched together

Apparently I've finished university FOREVER. I'm so sad it's over. We've still got to hand in all our work in a couple of weeks, put up a degree show and do New Designers in London so it's not quite goodbye yet but I miss it already. Despite this, I've been working on a project that has filled me with unexpected amounts of joy. 

Working with leather is a bit tricky, but when you slice through its buttery softness with a sharp knife or set your first rivet it's just the most exciting material.  I chose a beautiful dark tan leather and brass fittings - and so far, so good. I wanted to make a portrait-format rectangular satchel with backpack straps, to carry my laptop around. I love the old school satchels around at the moment but couldn't find any backpacks in a similar style. I am beyond excited to see how it turns out!

Good Sport

 You won't need to know me well to know that I'm no great sports fan. This editorial from GQ magazine (which until this week I suspected was a slightly porno lads' mag) was therefore well out of my comfort zone. It was about a film about the West Indies cricket team and loosely references the team's logo, but is mostly about a tripod made out of wickets. I hope it works.

Cover Design

This is the finished cover design for my Penguin Design Competition entry. I really struggled with how to represent the complex themes in One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. In the end a simple and graphic family tree seemed best, enabling me to choose some slinky typography to make it look grown-up. I'm rather pleased with it.