Art Design Studio Fine Art Tips / Creating Art in Small Studios. Yes it is a design studio located down town of our small mountain town

My Public D8 with the Brooks B67 Saddle, Santana Row, San Jose, CA

I purchased my Public D8 bike new in San Francisco about 2 years ago. I received a 20 percent discount on this bike because I happened to participate in a police investigation which lead to locating and returning a stolen bike which a customer purchased from the same store; a long story in it of itself.
Public Bikes is a company founded by Rob Forbes, who is also the founder of Design Within Reach, known for their high-end modern furniture.  After I purchased the bike, I've been wanting to upgrade the stock saddle and the grips with Brooks England products, a maker of beautifully hand-crafted bicycle accessories, to give it a nice finishing touch. I've always been a fan of Brooks England for their classic understated designs. Today I was pretty excited to receive the package containing a pair of brand new Brooks Slender leather grips which I ordered online a few days ago. Brooks Slender leather grips feature vegetable tanned leather and natural cork tape wrapped around an aluminum shell with one side being 130mm long and other 100mm; designed specifically for handlebars with twister shifter on one side.
These grips typically retails for about $90 dollars but I was able to pick them up for a great sales price of $68.94 including shipping at modernbikes.com. I know what you are thinking, "still quite expensive for just a pair of bicycle grips". But, what can I say? Just let me indulge a little. Well, in order to justify, if I may; just about 6 months ago, I was able to find two used but like-new condition Brooks saddles for $100 and I put one on my D8 and was able to sell the other one recently for nearly the same price I paid for the two saddles and it was more than enough to help pay for these new grips. Anyway, after I put them on, I took a little test ride around the block. Aside from being extra stylish, the smooth leather felt really nice; a huge difference from the stock rubber grips that came with the bike which had the bumpy texture and would dig into my palms. These grips are definitely a real nice finishing touch on a classic city bike. You can also purchase my "Brooks Saddle" print at my Etsy shop.

I bought these bikes; vintage '60s Raleigh RSW 16 (16 for the 16 inch wheels that are on the bike) and Graziella from a local Craigslist seller and is thinking of restoring them. The RSW is in pretty decent shape but Graziella is too rough to even consider restoring but it folds and has some cool parts that could be salvaged. Both bikes have some interesting history and they just have a real cool look to them. A friend of mine who's a bit of a bike aficionado thinks these bikes are the ugliest thing. I happened to disagree! I paid $40 dollars for both bikes which isn't much but how much money and time it's going to take to restore these bikes to a rideable condition is not yet determined. . . Not sure if it's even worth it. Anyway, both bikes have tires that need to be replaced among other things and I've been browsing  Ebay to see if I can find a nice pair of white, 16 inch tires that would go well with the RSW.  So far I only found new tires and none are white and they don't seem to fit the period of the bike very well.  I'm actually even considering buying a cheap, used 16 inch children's bike and just take the wheels off them and use it for these bikes.

I haven't posted in a while, but I have actually been sketching, as well as doing pre-press on some more cards and prints for the shop...I also started loading some images into my shop at Society6, which has been empty for a couple of years, well, really since I opened it. More is coming soon, but the place that scans my work is located next to the University of Ottawa, and they are bogged down with end of term student projects and therefore working more slowly than normal. Next week, I hope!

Work in progress on lichen drawing

I have started an Art Wall in our living room, where we can hang stuff and critique it...

Sorry for the reflected light...I took the curtains down to wash because we are having house guests next week...

And last, but not least, my baby Daniel is turning three on Sunday! Happy Birthday, little man!

An owl has moved into our woods! We often see him/her in the evening watching the long grass for mice. I decided to celebrate this development with a painting - a heart made from owls! I think its face looks like it should be smoking a pipe...

I was commissioned to do these five illustrations for Pearson Inc for book covers for the authors, Goldfield and Levack. So far, I had to create three images of Amelia Earhart(check my previous post for the other Earhart image), two images of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and one image of Jean Paul Sartre.

Goldfield-Amelia Earhart; © all rights reserved

Goldfield-Amelia Earhart; © all rights reserved

Levack-Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley; © all rights reserved

Levack-Mary Shelley; © all rights reserved

Levack-Jean Paul Sartre; © all rights reserved