Hello everyone, and welcome to another loose watercolour week! With Bonfire Night yesterday, and Remembrance Day this weekend, it seems like Christmas is just around the corner – which is both a terrifying and an amazing thought. It’s only seven weeks now until the big day, which is certainly something to behold, and if you’re anything like our house, holiday preparations have begun in earnest and there’s a faint rustle of tinsel coming down from the attic.
Did any of you catch any fireworks over the weekend? We had some bonfires on in the local area, and the whole weekend smelt like embers and toffee apples. There was also mulled wine and apple cider on offer – very seasonal!
In fitting with the festivities, last week’s live broadcast was ‘Merry Berries.’ It was great to see so many of you join in, and if you want to practice your craft skills this holiday season, it’s the perfect design for you to paint on your holiday cards! If you want to join in the fun this week, you can watch tonight’s broadcast here at 8pm GMT. If you want to catch up with past live broadcasts, you can watch them on my YouTube membership channel here.
This week, there was a new tutorial released on loosewatercolours.com. ‘Fir Tree Moon’ is another one perfect for your Christmas card designs if you want to send some festive cheer to your friends and family, and there’ll be more holiday-themed tutorials coming out very soon. This one is more of a landscape design, based on winter forests and crisp nights, but with a loose twist!
There’s also a new beginners’ tutorial available on Patreon this week, with ‘Loose Xmas Tree’ being another good one for holiday-themed arts and crafts. Click here to have a watch.
And if you’re thinking about Christmas presents this holiday season, why not gift a Loose Gang set to any budding painters in your life? If you’re starting the new year off with any painting resolutions, you can get kitted out with the perfect set for beginners. You can get a set here, and if you order now, they’ll be here in time for the holidays.
This week, I wanted to practice painting in motion, so I had a go at a train station scene! Inspired by plenty of time spent waiting for various trains, I tried to look at colour and light, and this painting went for more of an abstract theme. I created the shapes with big brush strokes, and went for strong, dark shades to really emphasise the shadows. What do you think? Let me know if you’d want to give it a go, and I can make a tutorial on how to paint this sort of scene.
That’s all from me this week, as I’m busy working on some more Christmas themed tutorials to brighten up your festive season – they’ll be with you very soon! As always, there’s an exclusive video at the bottom of this post as an extra special thank you to all you paid subscribers – it’s support like yours that makes this Substack possible. But I hope everyone’s feeling festive as the nights draw in, and I hope you all have some holiday cheer as this year starts to draw to a close. In the meantime, I’ll see you all next Monday, and until then, happy painting!