Tag Archives: Hollyhock

Foot Stool with Cut Flowers

This little footstool was commissioned as a companion piece to the Garden Fence Chest of Drawers.  The Sunflowers and Hollyhocks are painted in the trompe l’oeil style of realism.  They just pop off the surface!   The legs of the stool are the same blue as the sky in the first piece and the faux white slats match those I painted on the top of the chest.   Even the underside continues the illusion of slats.  And, yes, I painted my signature insect; Can you see the lady bug?  It is important that the little side buttons are painted white as they visually connect the top to the base, but I resisted the urge to painted anything additional on the blue surfaces because the stool told me No!!

Garden Fence Painted on Three Drawer Chest

I painted lots of pretty tall  flowers growing behind a picket fence on this solid wood, three drawer, storage piece.  Hollyhocks bloom in profusion up the front, right across all three drawers.  One of the side panels sports Sunflowers while the other has Morning Glories climbing up a wrought iron trellis.  Look closely and you will find three butterflies, a bumble bee, a lady bug, a dragon fly and two charming birdhouses.  The top is painted to appear like it is made of slats of wood.   The greenery wraps around to the back just enough to complete the design all the way.   This small chest stands 26 ” tall, is 12″ wide and 14″ deep (counting the knobs).  Perfect for a dorm room or even a bathroom!  This piece sold as soon as it was posted, however if you would like me to paint something in this style please fell free to contact me through this site.

Garden Mural

Harness Park on the Connecticut shore was the inspiration for this intense, hyper-realism mural, a most ambitious project.  I painted it on the wall of a small breakfast nook, creating the sensation of a garden being accessible right from the kitchen.  In preparation, I took photos from all over the park  and worked them into an imaginary ideal garden.  I painted the path and the base board to match the real stone tile floor.    The real gate you see is an antique wrought iron piece that the owner of the mural eventually attached to the wall so that it could swing open in welcome. The balance of the design is completed by the gate.

Many of the photos posted here were taken while the mural was in progress and you can discern my process in some of them.  If you look close you can see differences between views such as unfinished edges, butterflies that were added last and white spaces for the Peonies which were not yet painted.  Unfortunately these photos were taken in the days before I owned a digital camera, so I apologize for some fuzziness.