Barrel of Blooms

This washtub full of flowers is called ‘barrel of blooms’ and it’s a beauty from the new PB release. I worked on cold pressed watercolour paper in a stamp positioner so I could ink a section, stamp it, blend that section, wipe the stamp then ink another section.

I stamped colour by colour, inking with distress ink cubes and markers. Once I’ve stamped a section I blend it with a paintbrush pulling out the ink of the outline and adding extra where necessary. I used a couple of different green inks for the leaves, candied apple, spiced marmalade and dried marigold for the flowers then a mix of brown and grey for the barrel. All the inks are listed below. Because I do all the stamping and painting with the panel in the stamp positioner I am able to re-stamp a section after I’ve painted to add some of the detail back in.

To ground the image I painted some faded jeans and hickory smoke ink around the base and behind the barrel. I used a dark blue inktense pencil and the Wendy Vecchi stay-tion + ruler to add the look of wood wall behind then matted the panel with co-ordinating blue cardstock.

I don’t have a barrel tub like this one for my flowers but I have three old galvanised tin tubs filled with herbs and they are thriving in the current summer weather.

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