31. Weekly Round Up!

Heading to Cornwall, Diary Comic and The Bloomsbury Club

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Hello fellow sketchers!

I'm writing this with my travel sketching kit packed and ready beside me - next week, hubby and I are off to Cornwall for a couple of nights without our boys. I’m so looking forward to some uninterrupted sketching time by the sea, and I'm particularly looking forward to visiting the Tate at St Ives.

My Travel Sketching Kit

I've filmed a little video showing exactly what I'm taking with me - you can watch it here:

It was fun attempting to pack a compact kit with everything I need, without being too much!! It probably is too much to be honest ;-)

My kit includes my current fave Stillman and Birn Epsilon pocket sketchbook, my tiny Schmincke retro palette tucked into a gorgeous Peg and Awl Mini Sendak case, and a carefully selected selection of brushes and pens in a Midori mesh case. Everything fits perfectly together - compact but complete.

This Week's Diary Comic Adventure

In

Jane Porter

’s diary comic class this week, we explored sensory comics, and I attempted to capture the sound of all the different birds I hear in my garden. I enjoyed the challenge trying to convey the volume and rhythm of different bird calls - making the calls bold and large for the Raven’s ‘CAW’, while the gentle ‘chiff chaff’ of the little Chiffchaff sang away in the distance…

Another great class - thanks Jane!

The Bloomsbury Club Portraits

Helen Birch

’s weekly 'Inspiration' class with Artist in Residence took us into the world of the Bloomsbury Group - a fascinating circle of writers, artists, and intellectuals who gathered around Virginia Woolf and her sister Vanessa Bell in early 20th century London. The Bloomsbury Group championed artistic freedom, rejected Victorian social conventions, and created a supportive community where literature, art, and progressive ideas flourished. Key figures included Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant, Roger Fry, and Lytton Strachey - each bringing their own creative genius to this influential movement that helped shape modern British culture.

Helen set us an art supply relay challenge, and we sketched portraits of various Bloomsbury members. I worked with watercolour pencil, ballpoint pen, and Pitt Oil Pencil - a combination that felt loose and expressive.

Looking Ahead

I'm hoping to fill some pages with coastal sketches over the next few days with that famous Cornish light and coastal views that I can’t wait to sketch. I'll be sharing glimpses of the trip on Instagram Stories and my substack notes while I am there, and I’ll hopefully be able to do a proper sketchbook flip-through when I’m back.

Until next week, keep sketching!

Emma x

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P.S. If you're ever putting together your own travel sketching kit, I'd love to hear what makes it into your essential selection. It’s such a personal choice - what feels indispensable to one artist might be completely different for another.