Yesterday was the final in my series of Watercolour Pencil sketching classes at Dromkeen homestead just outside of Melbourne. We had a visually decadent and delicious High Tea sketching class.

The students arrived at 2pm, entering from the chilly 5 degrees outside to be greeted by the warmth of the lit fireplace and a table beautifully set for a feast.

We spent the first 40 minutes getting to explore and learn about watercolour pencils, waterbrushes and watercolour sketchbooks. Then the coffees, teas, hot chocolates, sandwiches and savories arrived – and the Sketching began!!! There were decisions to be made on what to eat and what to sketch,

At 3.00pm the sweets arrived. A decadent choice to eat and sketch, (and some colourful fruits too). Below are some of the many wonderful sketches from the day. People chose different foods to draw and objects to sketch. The beautiful teacups with their delicate designs also featured in many sketches. I regularly reminded people to eat and drink as it is so easy to get carried away with sketching and forget to eat .

It was a wonderful way to spent a winters’ afternoon, Good company, delicious treats and drawing. What more could you ask for?!

Many thanks to Bernadette and Denise for organising the day and cooking up some amazingly delicious food. Dromkeen is a world famous historic homestead, featuring original Australian book illustration. Their tearoom serves delicious home made food and quality coffee and tea. They provide educational programs for visiting schools, gallery tours for other groups and also provide facilities for business functions, weddings, birthday parties & other special occasions.

I do not have any watercolour pencil sketching classes in the calendar at the moment, but am planning for Spring and Summer ! To find out when new classes are announced, sign up for my newsletter on this website. In the meantime some of my watercolour pencil drawings are available for purchase printed as greeting cards on my ETSY online store.

I recently was appointed Social Media Reporter for Clunes Booktown Festival by Melbourne City of Literature. I sketched at Clunes on the day and wrote about in two blogposts.

• http://alissaduke.com/2019/04/next-weekend-clunes-booktown-festival.html
• http://alissaduke.com/2019/05/clunes-booktown-festival.html

I was also required to submit a Creative Response, The brief : The final creative piece is some form of artwork made in response to your overall festival experience. This piece is to act as a deeper reflection on your part about your experience of the festival, and to give you another opportunity to really get creative and experiment. You can think of this piece as either a summary of your whole experience, or an opportunity to really dive deep into one aspect of your experience you want to explore/portray.

I decided to draw in a book I purchased at Clunes. A previous blogpost described my plan.

Today I can show you all of the sketches that I did in the book I bought at Clunes Booktown Festival. I have all of my Clunes Sketches in a flickr album.

My book is : Language and Ideas: a course in English Expression for Junior Forms. Book 1by Lane, Brereton, Dobell and Nelson published by Hall’s Book Store Pty Ltd Melbourne 1964. 309 pages. Previously owned by David J Netherway (in child’s writing in pencil in the front page). Cost $4

The town of Clunes, the people and the books reflect my experience at Clunes Booktown Festival. Combined together, these three elements created a unique event with a special atmosphere.