Our Lawrence Art Shop has been working on a collaborative craft project since early October to bring a Christmas forest scene to life. Our talented crew of artists made over a dozen figurines and set up a wintry street leading to a miniature model of the Lawrence Art Shop. Using commonly available materials in the household such as newspaper, cardboard and glue you can make your own paper mache models by following this simple guide.
Yupo is a new synthetic paper with an incredible versatility, available in loose sheets and pads. You can use it with almost any dry and wet media which makes it great for mixed-media artists and experimenters like myself. I got excited when I heard Yupo is suitable for watercolour – I couldn’t imagine how this glossy, cotton-free, tree-free paper takes water – and I couldn’t stop there! I conducted a series of tests with watercolour, gouache, acrylics, Indian ink, pencil, alcohol markers and charcoal to find out what this paper is capable of – have a look at the results!
Relief printing is an exciting art form with amazing creative possibilities but just like with any craft, you need to be equipped with the right tools and information to get the best of your materials and your ambition. We compiled 5 tips and hints to help you on your journey to learning block printing.
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Once again the Lawrence staff got together for an evening of fun, learning and culinary delights. This time, the demo was lead by Georgia Flowers who taught us about lino printing. Some of us have never tried this medium so we were very excited to put practice behind our product knowledge and test the different relief printing materials we offer. Stay tuned for our finished results!
Relief Printing Materials: Bench Hook, C Set of Pfeil Tools, Safety Hand Guard, Inking Slab, Tracing Paper, Japanese Woodcut Tool Set, Lawrence Durathene Roller, Cranfield Black Water Soluble Relief Ink, Faber Castell PVC-free Eraser, 2B Faber Castell 9000 Pencil, 10 x 15cm Lino Sheet, 10 x 15cm Japanese Vinyl Sheet, Imitation Japanese Vellum
In this blog post we will be comparing brush types for watercolours, oils and acrylics to aid anyone starting out in their choice of medium. We will discuss materials, shapes and sizes you can expect to find in each category and help you chose the right brushes for your needs. We also asked three artists working at Lawrence Art Supplies to give us some hints and tips and share their experience with different brushes.
My patio needed a good summer clean so to get in the mood I planned a craft project around it: painting flower pots! This step-by-step guide will explain how to use acrylic paint to decorate your pots and other terracotta ornaments. Patio before and after pictures – stay tuned!
We had a fabulous evening of fun last month where Lawrence staff members were given a screen printing demonstration by Vicky Ramsey printmaker. We thought we would share some photos and wisdom with those of you fascinated by this craft or looking to start out in screen printing.
Screen printing materials: Cutting Mat, Wooden Screen, Fabriano Accademia paper, Speedball Acrylic Screen Printing Inks (Medium Red, Process Blue), Artist Quality Squeegee 15cm, pencil, Craft Knife and stencil paper
What better way to kick off the new year than to pick up a new medium you haven’t tried before, from a manufacturer that you can trust. In this post, we will tempt you with one of our favourite brands – M Graham – who manufactures oils, acrylics, watercolours and gouache too. Their paints are of superior quality – made with ingredients such as honey and walnut oil – if you have tried one range you will certainly want to try them all and if you are completely new to M Graham, read on and find out why we recommend them for the serious artist.
Valentines Day is just around the corner and it’s not too late for a last minute greeting card. With regard to the success of our latest card making post, we’ve put together a bunch of ideas for those of you looking to surprise a special someone with a hand-made card.
Pre-made cards and envelopes are the best way to go when you are in a hurry. Most come in packs of 5, 20 or a 100, making sure you are well prepared for the next occasion. What’s even better is that you don’t have to sacrifice the quality of paper as you will find paper specially crafted for the card making enthusiast.
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he Fabriano Mediovalis is a beautiful crisp white paper, ideal for pen, pencil, watercolour, pastel, charcoal and many other techniques. It is also suitable for inkjet printing and even bookbinding! With four deckle edges and slightly textured surface at 260gsm, this has been a huge favourite. It comes in packs of 5, 20 and 100, multiple sizes, landscape and portrait format, flat and foldable varieties. Additionally, the 20 and 100 packs make an ideal present as they come in a beautiful gift box.
If you are looking for a handmade paper, Khadi is 
the way to go. This beautiful Indian paper is a white 100% recycled long-fibred cotton rag with a unique texture and a 210 gsm weight. Similarly to the Mediovalis, this card and envelope combo comes in packs of 5, 20 and 100. The square shape enhances the hand-made quality of this paper and you can be sure that your greeting card will look unique each time you make one.
We also have a range of blank cards and envelopes in packs of 50, in white and ivory colours. The texture of the paper is smooth which makes it ideal for a range of drawing media as well as to use it as a blank base to mount artwork onto. The weight of the card is 220gsm, while the envelopes are a light 100 gsm.
If you are interested in creating your own cards for 
Valentines Day, you can now buy Maya Card in A4 and A3 sizes on our website. The benefit of this is that you have control over the shape and the size of your greeting card and you can choose from 29 colours which makes them the ultimate base for putting your own designs onto.
Here, I created a simple watercolour design on my favourite Canson Heritage paper, ready to be glued onto Intensive Pink Maya Card.
We hope this entry helped find the right card so you can be ready for Valentines Day! You can order everything mentioned in this post online, via Mail order by calling us on 01273 260260 ext1. or by visiting our Hove Shop on Portland Road. Happy Valentines!
We decided to start 2018 with a brand new website – www.lawrence.co.uk that will have everything our customers love about Lawrence Art Supplies and loads of new features, too – from shopping on smart devices to wishlists and easy check-out!
