Hello Tunisia!

Happy 2017! Slowly getting back into the swing of things with some blog updates. This is a postage stamp for Tunisia - it features the Ksar Ouled Soltane, a fortified granary found in Southern Tunisia.

Some previous iterations:

Playing around with layout:

What do you think?

Hello Mauritius!

When I was a kid I used to collect stamps. (Such a nerd right?) I loved that you could learn so much about a place through stamps - I would often go and research the different and exotic places that I saw. I still have a stamp book full of the stamps I collected! Recently it's also been so lovely being part of the Postcrossing community and receiving and exchanging postcards from all over the world! Always so interesting to see different countries' stamps!

So this is my first stab at a postage stamp. 

For me nothing quite says "Mauritius" like the Dodo bird especially as it was the only known habitat of the bird! The Dodo was first spotted by Dutch settlers when they arrived in Mauritius in 1598 and it was hunted to extinction in 1662.

A few process sketches.

Playing around with colour.

 The final piece. 

I'm thinking of trying an even more limited colour palette too, possibly even it being completely linework. What do you think?

You can take a look at some interesting stamps here and here!

Guess Who's Back, Back Again

So as you can see dust has been collecting on my blog as I've just been too busy working and hardly sleeping to devote a good amount of time to it. I'm hoping to get a lot better at this!

On those rare days where I've had a little spare time, I've been dabbling in Postcrossing, where you send a postcard to a random person in the world (you're given a random address after registering) and receive a postcard back from another random person in the world.

So far, I've sent two postcards and have received three very lovely postcards. (I've taken out my address because stalkers can be weird. And also because I really wanted to show you the awesome stamps on the back. Yes, I am a nerd. I collected children's book stamps when I was a kid.)

This postcard was sent to me by Dasha, a Russian postcrosser. The photograph on front shows a young boy and others dancing the flamenco.

This was a postcard posted by David from South Carolina. SO lovely! It shows the S.S. Florida.

This postcard was from Adam in Poland who was keen to do a direct swap. It depicts a ship sailing on the Baltic Sea.

I love seeing so many different stamps from different parts of the world!


Speaking of stamps, how cool are our South African 3D dinosaur stamps? Here's the postcard I designed and sent, using my illustration of Cape Town City Hall on the front.

It was so fun posting it! It took me right back to being in London, near Russell Square sending postcards to friends and family back home. I'm hoping to travel again soon, just so I can send some more postcards back home ;)