Limited time offer:
This new course is available at an introductory price of £38 until 3.00pm (UK time) on Thursday 10th September, after that it will only be available at its regular price of £58
Wander & Wonder
Filling a sketchbook full of nature inspired moments
A self-paced online class to help you fill your sketchbook with nature-inspired ideas.
If you've ever spotted an interesting plant, flower, seed head or leaf and wondered how you might explore that in a sketchbook, Wander & Wonder is for you.
My own sketchbook ideas very often begin outside. Something catches my eye, I take a photograph, bring it home and begin playing with it on the page.
Wander & Wonder is built around that simple process. We'll gather a small collection of nature-inspired starting points and explore them in our sketchbooks through drawing, colour, collage and mixed media.
One starting point can lead to all sorts of different pages, and that's really what I want to explore with you in this course.
Nature is our starting point, rather than something we're trying to reproduce faithfully. We'll take the shapes, colours, patterns and details that catch our attention and see what they might become in our sketchbooks.
A simple way into your sketchbook
The process I share in this class is straightforward. Go for a walk. Notice something that catches your eye. Take a photo with your phone. Bring the idea home. Explore it in your sketchbook. See where it leads.
Sometimes that might become a drawing. Sometimes a colourful mixed media page. Or it might even become the starting point for something you couldn't possibly have predicted.
That's one of the things I love most about sketchbooks. The sense of possibility.
This course might be for you if...
You'd love to spend more time in your sketchbook and would like plenty of ideas to get you started.
You notice interesting things in nature and would love to explore more of them in your sketchbook.
You enjoy drawing, colour, collage and mixed media, or you'd like to experiment with them more.
You'd like a simple process for taking something you've noticed outside and developing it into your own sketchbook pages.
You're creatively curious and happy to experiment and see where an idea takes you.
You'd like to become more confident noticing what interests you in your own work and following those ideas further.
The world is full of starting points
We'll be drawing plants and taking inspiration from the natural world throughout this course.
One of the lovely things that happens when you start looking for sketchbook ideas is that you begin to see them everywhere. An interesting shape, an unexpected colour combination, a tangle of stems, a tiny detail you might want to explore.
The world becomes full of creative starting points.
And your sketchbook soon becomes another source of ideas. A colour you want to use again. A shape you'd like to explore further. A little bit of a page that sparks another thought.
One thing leads to another and that's part of the joy of keeping a sketchbook.
What we’ll explore together
Finding wonder
We'll begin by going wandering and gathering a small collection of things that catch your eye in the natural world.
I'll show you how I use my phone to collect shapes, colours, patterns and little moments that I'd like to take back into my sketchbook.
We'll be doing this close to home in our neighbourhood, in gardens, parks, streets and all the ordinary places where nature appears.
And if getting out and about isn't possible, I'll share some wonderful online resources, as well as a collection of my own photographs that you're very welcome to use.
Into the sketchbook
Back at home, we'll begin exploring what we've gathered.
We'll use drawing, colour, collage and mixed media, with five simple creative approaches that give you lots of different ways into a page.
We'll work with grids and boxes, draw more freely, explore borders and backgrounds, and make collage pieces that can be moved around and combined in different ways.
You'll begin with a small collection of images and discover just how many different directions they can take you.
Infinite playground
In this final module, we'll go back into the pages we've already made and explore where they might take us next.
We'll combine ideas, layer things together, revisit something we enjoyed and try it again in a different way.
This is where one page begins to feed another.
We'll also start paying attention to what keeps interesting you in your own work, the colours, marks, shapes and ways of working you find yourself drawn to.
The idea is that when the course finishes, you have plenty of ways to keep going.
About the course
Wander & Wonder is a self-paced online course made up of fifteen video lessons, with around three and a half hours of video in total. Each lesson also comes with written notes and guidance.
You'll get instant access to the whole lot when you join and you'll have access to the course for two years. There's no need to rush through it. Take your time, spend longer with the ideas that interest you and come back whenever you fancy another wander through your sketchbook.
Alongside the practical art-making, I'll share some of the ways I think about sketchbooks, developing ideas and building a creative practice over time.
My hope is that this is a course you'll find yourself returning to as your own sketchbook practice grows.
A sketchbook full of nature-inspired drawings, experiments, colour and collage.
A creative process you can return to whenever you're wondering what to explore next.
Lots of ways to take something that catches your eye in nature and explore it in your sketchbook.
More confidence to experiment, combine ideas and see where they lead.
A growing sense of the colours, marks, shapes and ways of working that interest you.
And perhaps most importantly, a sketchbook that feels like your own.
By the end of the course I hope you'll have...
I like to think of a sketchbook as a greenhouse. A place where ideas germinate and grow over time. That idea runs through everything we do in this course..
A sketchbook can be our creative greenhouse
I like to think of a sketchbook as a greenhouse. A place where ideas germinate and grow over time.
Some pages are beginnings. Some ideas are explored again and again. Things get layered, changed, cut up, combined and taken in different directions.
That's very much how we'll work in Wander & Wonder. We'll begin with a small collection of starting points and see how many different ways we can explore and develop them.
As your sketchbook fills, it also becomes somewhere to look for what comes next. You begin to notice the colours combinations you enjoy, the shapes you enjoy making and the ideas you'd like to explore further.
One thing leads to another, and the sketchbook keeps growing.
What you’ll need:
I’m a great believer in using what you already have and adapting the process to suit the materials you enjoy using.
For this course it will be helpful to have:
A phone or camera for taking photographs on your walks, and a way to view your photographs while you work.
A sketchbook that can take a little mixed media, paint and collage I use a Stillman & Birn sketchbook and one from Fabriano.
Some loose paper for making collage pieces.
Glue and scissors.
Watercolour paint and brushes.
Acrylic ink, I use four or five colours of FW ink from Daler Rowney.
Coloured pencils and/or water-based marker pens.
Masking tape for one of the exercises.
You don't need to have everything on this list. Start with what you have, use the materials you enjoy and adapt things as you go.
My hope is that Wander & Wonder leaves you excited to head out for a walk and gives you lots of interesting ways to take the things that catch your eye into your sketchbook.
If the course turns out not to be for you, that's absolutely fine.
Just let me know within 14 days and I'll refund you in full, no questions asked.
I'd much rather you were genuinely pleased that you joined than felt you had to stick with something that wasn't right for you.
I hope you’ll love it
A note from me
I often say that my sketchbooks taught me how to become an artist.
They gave me somewhere to experiment, follow ideas and slowly discover the things that really interested me.
That's what I hope Wander & Wonder gives you too.
A way to take the things that interest you in the natural world and explore them in your sketchbook.
And as your pages begin to accumulate, to become curious about your own work too.
At first we use the sketchbook to observe the world. Over time, it becomes a place to observe our own creative practice.
I think that's one of the great joys of keeping a sketchbook.
What we'll cover:
We'll explore five simple creative approaches, each one a different doorway into your sketchbook, each one adaptable, each one full of possibility.
Grids and boxes
A simple organising structure that gives you somewhere to begin and creates immediate variety on the page.
Drawing
Using your nature-inspired images as a jumping off point rather than something to copy accurately. Loose, playful, exploratory.
Borders
Framing your pages with pattern, colour or mark making. A simple idea that can transform a page.
Backgrounds
Building colour, texture and atmosphere before anything else is added. Creating an interesting sketchbook full of colour and variety
Collage
Drawing and painting outside your sketchbook, cutting it up and arranging it on the page. Playful, forgiving and full of happy surprises.
Everything I share is repeatable. Come back to these approaches with different photographs, different materials or at a different time of year and you'll get completely different pages.
And as the course progresses, we'll begin combining them too. There are so many ways these simple ideas can grow.
This class may not be right for you:
Wander & Wonder is quite an exploratory course. I'll give you clear demonstrations and ideas to work with, and you'll be using your own photographs and making your own creative decisions along the way.
It will probably suit you best if you're happy to experiment, try things out and occasionally have no idea exactly how a page is going to turn out.
It might not be the right class for you if:
You're looking for a step-by-step class where you copy exactly what I make and everyone ends up with a similar page.
You're primarily interested in highly realistic botanical drawing. The work we'll make is much more playful, expressive and semi-abstract.
You prefer to know exactly how an artwork will turn out before you begin.
You're looking for individual feedback or a student community. Wander & Wonder is completely self-paced and doesn't include personalised critique or a Facebook group.
This new course is available at an introductory price of £38 until 3.00pm (UK time) on Thursday 10th September, after that it will only be available at its regular price of £58