influences ...

I am getting the hang of this blogging wonder now, and a warm thank you to all who come and visit, but do leave comments too. It is just magical to reach out to like minds and make these gentle connections.

I am at the computer a lot at the moment, toiling away designing my next product ... the 'City'.  Since a small child I have drawn buildings and cottages, created dens under blankets behind the sofa, perfect peace and isolation from the real world, all aglow with a flickery torch and a cheese sandwich. Then progressing to a camp in the twisted boughs of the old rhododendron in our garden, then when old enough to wield a hammer, tree houses in every suitable tree. My father would marvel at my tenacity and burglary skills in stealing his best tools, planks of wood and best rope from his workshop. Happy Days. But to make a little set of fantasy buildings seems quite apt really after all these years of dream nesting.

I still have a much loved book from childhood 'A Little House of your Own' by Beatrice Schenk de Regniers with drawings by Irene Haas, and like many books from my childhood they have played an important part in the stored visual library of inspiration in my memory. We all have these stores. Brian Wildsmith was also a huge influence on my work from a very early age and I have a collection of his books old and new.