Tag: seamountainco

Art tambay

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A few months ago, Clair invited me to join their art tambay at Trinoma. This was months in the making since it was hard to get everyone together due to their busy schedule. We met up at CBTL Trinoma.

Work in progress.

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The people who attended were me, Clair (@claircolors), Priane (@priichan), Kat (@kiyasuriin), Chichi (@chichilittle) and Francis. They met up at around 11am, while I just woke up at that time HUHUHU. When I arrived, they were already painting their artworks. The task for that day was to make a self-portrait. I hurriedly took a selfie HAHA and sketched myself.

It’s been a while. ♥

So far, I’m quite satisfied with my personalized watercolor palette. I can do florals and the occasional portraits. I really love seamountainco’s Yellow Ochre, Philippine Indigo, and Indian Red! Honestly, I felt a bit pressured because everyone’s SO GOOD! Check out their artworks below:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BkZ3hbElyeM/?taken-by=kiyasuriin

Thank you for the invite! I hope I could join the next one. ♥ Thank you for sharing your convention experiences and other stuff.

Handmade watercolors by seamountainco

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I’d like to talk about seamountainco, one of my favorite watercolors! Seamountainco is a local store that specializes in portable handmade watercolor sets & notebooks. Their products are perfect for those who love to travel! The owner is a dear friend of mine & also one of the co-founding members of January Makers PH. ♥ Though we are friends, this post is not sponsored in any way & is not biased. Hopefully.

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(This post is long overdue. I planned on posting this last July 2017! But I was too lazy to do the sample artworks.)

The basic set (middle tin with 4 watercolor half pans).

We received one of the first batches of the Basic set last February 2017. You can read more about that here. The Basic set includes a portable tin can, four artist grade handmade watercolors in half pans that are highly pigmented with excellent light fastness. The four colors are: Ultramarine Blue, Indian Red, Yellow Ochre, and Raw Earth Umber.

We were tasked with reviewing the quality of the first batch. It really is highly pigmented. Just one swipe is enough. ♥ I used to joke that her watercolor is similar to the dishwashing liquid commercial: “Isang patak, sangkatutak!“. HAHA sorry.

On fabriano acquarello postcard paper.

What can you do with the Basic Set? I usually use mine for my sunflower watercolor paintings. I really love the yellow ochre for this. Its versatile that it can do the light yellows and also do the darker, muted tones that I want on my paintings. (Did that make sense?!). The only problem I think is the green. You can mix Ultramarine & Yellow Ochre to create an Olive green, but its not my preferred tone of green.

On further meet-ups, I received these from Jean: Philippine Indigo (aka #Jeandigo), Venetian Red, Verona Green, Cassel Earth, and Nicosia Green. I also bought the Purple Ochre, Pink Pipestone and Gold during our recent bazaar.

Clockwise from Top Right: Philippine Indigo, Venetian Red, Purple Ochre, Gold, Pink Pipestone, Nicosia Green, Verona Green, and Cassel Earth.

Even though seamountainco aims to cater to those who love to travel, their sets are also versatile in other subjects. My fellow January Makers PH members can attest to that! Check out their works below:

I’m very happy with my seamountainco set. ♥ I plan on buying more when I get the chance! HAHA.

You can follow seamountainco on Instagram & Facebook! For online orders, click here. ♥

Something New

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On one of my recent art tambays with Hannah, we talked about our art. I told her that I was tired of painting flowers, that I didn’t want to known as the girl who can only paint one thing. She agreed saying that she was also tired of seeing my sunflower paintings, “eww”. Of course she said it in jest, but it got to me a bit HAHA. So I decided I’ll try to paint something different, something new. I went with food illustration which is Monique’s specialty.

Matcha Parfait and Halo-halo ♥

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It all started with the left painting. I was craving for Kissako’s matcha parfait that time, so I painted it HAHA. The right one was a request by a friend. I used a Sakura Gelly roll for the whites for both paintings. Speaking of Kissako, we went there last year to have that same parfait. Read more about it on Inggo’s blog. (Yup, it’s back!)

I also attempted to paint Friuli Trattoria‘s margherita pizza and ravioli. I don’t like my first attempt, haha. Its a bit obvious that I tried to save the drawing with inks. I’ll try better next time. I also painted my favorite dessert from said resto: their tiramisu gelato (below, left). The pyramid-shaped thing is their pharaoh’s delight gelato. I thought it looked challenging to paint a white gelato.

Avocado Sans Rival (Left) & Avocado Cupcake (Right).

I find food illustration a bit challenging. From the photo above, I tried inking the paintings to see what it would look like. I liked the effects on the cake, but meh on the cupcake. These are Lia’s Cakes in Seasons cakes. ♥ I already blogged about them here. The avocado sans rival is my favorite!

Puto Bumbong Cake (Left) and Avocado Cheesecake (Right).

More Lia’s Cakes. I haven’t tried the puto bumbong cake yet, but I’m really curious about the taste. Their only branch is in Kapitolyo, so its a bit of a hassle to commute from where I live (QC). The avocado cheesecake is also one of my favorites.

And finally, I tried painting matcha desserts referenced online. I tried to make different line thickness for the white parts and failed. HAHA. The main color that I used here is Winsor & Newton’s Sap green, mixed with a bunch of random colors.

Overall, I enjoyed my experience with food illustration. Its a bit challenging on deciding on how I want to render the drawing: to ink or not, to be realistic with it or as loose as I can. I used my moleskine watercolor pad for this (which I bought years ago and didn’t like). But now I love this pad HAHA. I guess through experience with watercolor? I want to try painting food again soon, but for now, I’ll try another different subject.

Our First Workshop

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Finally had time to sit down and blog! We joined The Craft Central’s 1st Birthday Celebration at Greenbelt 5 last September 26 to October 1 as January Makers PH. We held our first watercolor workshop there!

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I was honestly terrified teaching a workshop. First, I’m not sure with the basics of watercolor since it wasn’t taught formally back in college. Second, it was my first time to teach students who paid (lol, I had tons of guinea pigs though). Third, I was scared that my students won’t learn a thing from me. Finally, I’m an introvert so I had NO IDEA if I could pull it off.

Me, explaining the color wheel.

Thankfully, my stage muthers/a.k.a. the rest of the January Makers PH team: Jean, Monique, and Hannah were there to help me out the whole time. They helped with the paper cups filled with water, took photos while I was teaching, and also helped with the cleanup after the workshop. They were my support throughout the day. ♥

Karen, starting with the color wheel.

After the quick introduction, we started with the color wheel. Learning the color wheel is one of the fundamentals. It would help in color choices and also for paint mixing.

Shayne, starting with her sunflower!

Learning how to draw a sunflower is easy. They also joked about my methods. Step 1 is “draw a circle”. Step 2 is “draw a tear drop shape”. Step 3 is “surround circle with a lot of tears”. HAHA.

Busy, busy.

I also let them try my seamountainco palette so they could see the difference with student grade paints to artist grade paints. They also had their own seamountainco dot cards that were included in the workshop. Thanks again, Jean! ♥

The rest of the workshop I went around to check & guide them one-on-one. Most of the participants were beginners, so I had to check & comment with their progress. Even though I taught them my style of painting, their own style showed through! ♥

Jade’s painting. | Karen’s painting.

Shayne’s painting. | Celso’s painting.

Katya’s painting. | Paola’s painting.

Gillian’s painting. | Sam’s painting.

My own painting plus Katya’s watercolor paper given to me. Thank you so much! ♥

The final homework for the students. Beautiful lettering & pouch from Jade.

Overall, it was a great learning experience! I think I still need to improve on conveying my thoughts to people. I hoped my students learned something watercolor-related from me. I heard they learned life lessons from my workshop?!

Thank you to The Craft Central for the workshop opportunity and venue. To my January Maker sisters. To my students. And to my guinea pigs lol I learned something from teaching you guys hahaha. ♥

Hopefully I could improve some more & organize another workshop. ♥

Artworks (July 2017- September 2017)

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Another compilation post! The last time I did this was last May, I think. So here are the art works that are yet featured here on my blog. Picture heavy post ahead! ♥

An attempt with landscape.

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My cover photo was an attempt at plein air or landscape painting of my client’s farm at Iba, Zambales. I brought my seamountainco set with me, assuming that we’d stop by the beach HAHA. Unfortunately, they were far from the beach.

Left: Practicing hydrangeas again | Right: An attempt at magnolias.

Before & After photo of my phaelaenopsis orchid painting. I turned this one into an individual sticker. ♥

More magnolia practice. I’m also practicing painting white flowers recently. I like the challenge.

Paper tests by painting sunflowers. The left one is the Strathmore Visual Journal paper. The other one is Hahnemuhle watercolor postcard. Portrait practice using my W&N cotman set. ♥

Sunflower during another art tambay at Makati. ♥ This is so beautiful in real life! Andrea gave me a sample of her handmade sparkly watercolor which I used for this piece. ♥

Left: Peony practice on Berkeley paper. I don’t like it, haha. | Right: Peony practice on my Monologue notebook using Mikalaro’s waterbrushes.

Left: More peony practice. I still don’t like it HAHA. | Right: Another peony practice! This was done during another art tambay with friends.

I turned one of my early peony paintings into an individual sticker. Pictured here is seamountainco’s new product: a small tin case that houses 16 handmade watercolors with a separate mixing plate. Its sooooo cute! ♥

And that’s it for now HAHA. Looking at my artworks and my comments, it seems like I’m way too hard on myself. Maybe its because your worst critic is yourself? I’m still not satisfied with the way I do peonies. But I’m trying my best to improve. I think I’m comparing my current artworks with the previous ones. Right now, they are too “controlled” looking compared to my noob days with “careless, loose strokes“. Sigh. Its hard to find the balance that I want.

But let’s keep trying.

Post cards

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Hello again! So sorry for not updating as much as I used to. I was busy with bazaar preps among other things. Now that things have slowed down a bit, I realized that I haven’t uploaded some better shots of my postcards yet here on my blog. So this blog post is dedicated to it! ♥

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My test prints with my seamountainco set.

This was taken during our dinner at Hole in the Wall.

At Seda Vertis North.

My bloom with Kenneth Cobonpue’s bloom chairs. ♥

Another Seda shot.

My postcards are 4″ x 6″ sized 300gsm which you can buy as a set or individually through our  Facebook page. Please check them out as our other products are also uploaded there. ♥

We also sell our products at a cheaper price during bazaars and the next one is this weekend! August 26-27, 2017 at Providore, Upper Ground, SM Aura. You can check our my Instagram page or our January Makers PH Instagram page for updates! Hope to see you!

Pagtitipon 5

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A few weeks ago was January Makers PH‘s third event! We participated in “Pagtitipon 5: Kaligrapiya, Art Tambay, At Iba Pa” held in SM Aura last July 22. The usual members who joined were:  Jean (owner of seamountainco), Monique (food illustrator), Hannah (various illustrator), and I (floral illustrator). ♥

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This event was a calligrapher & artist’s dream. ♥ All of the vendors were selling calligraphy items, watercolor paint, washi tapes, stamps, and a lot more! They even had a destash station with really good deals. (I’m still sad that I didn’t get the 16-color prang set for 50php!).

The event was a huge success! There were a lot of people who joined the free calligraphy workshops by the artists. We didn’t get to join some workshops because we were so busy manning our booth!

A huge thank you for those who bought our postcards, stickers, and watercolor paint! I would like to thank my blockmates Dustin+Eandra, Ivy, Ruth+Joy who came to visit our event. ♥ See you on the next one!

Art Tambays

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First of all, I would like to apologize for the lack of posts. I’ve rekindled my addiction to Ragnarok Online lol. We’re in Thor server! Weeks after our bazaar, I’ve met up with old & new artist friends for an art tambay.

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The first art tambay was during the Art Mod event at Megamall with Clair aka claircolors, Priane aka priichanpanda, kiyasurin, and Yin aka lostlibraryin. We looked for a vacant coffee stall and had our art tambay there. This is what I did during our art tambay:

Sunflowers again.

I also taught them how to paint sunflowers and hydrangea but I don’t think I’m an effective teacher. The only thing they learned was Step 1: Draw a circle lololol. I also let them try my seamountainco set. I’m also interested in Priane’s White Nights watercolor set. Apparently the price is a good deal for the amount and quality. You can get them at Deovir.

I did this one during my art tambay with my cousin.

The next art tambay was at Greenbelt Makati with Jan Makers PH Jean & Monique, Shine aka tingeofshine, and Andrea aka mabuhaydiy. I also invited other people but they were all busy huhuhu. This was a productive art tambay since everyone were all busy painting. We didn’t do this for a long time! It was refreshing lolololol. Andrea also let me try her handmade watercolors: the Mermaid gold and Rose gold. It made my sunflower painting soooo sparkly! ♥

Sunflowers & Eucalyptus leaves are my current favorites.

Another attempt at peonies.

We also did an activity where we exchanged and painted on all papers using our seamountainco products. This was a bit challenging since our timer was only set to 3 minutes each. It was fun though! We all got a souvenir to take home. This is a great idea! We could do this every art tambay next time. ♥

Our seamountainco sets and artworks. ♥

I can’t wait for the next one! ♥

Maker’s Market

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The week after our first bazaar, we joined another one! This is Maker’s Market at Century City Mall Makati. We were located on the fourth floor this time. And instead of 3, Hannah finally joined us! So the members of January Makers PH who joined were:  Jean (owner of seamountainco), Monique (food illustrator), Hannah (various illustrator), and I (floral illustrator). ♥

Table Set up! ♥

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Another bazaar meant new challenges. Since we were located on the fourth floor open area, we had to take extra care of our products in case it got windy. It was a good thing that we got tape.

The first day table set-up. ♥

I didn’t get to take much photos during the event. But our social media feed were updated. HAHA. Here are some of our posts:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BU31D8zAo2H/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BU5zwhmgM0O/

The last night.

We were in between beadsmustbecrazy, handmade by zaza, and Nifty store PH. Some of the sellers from the previous bazaar were also present here. My professor’s booth – Ubots were located at the ground floor. I also introduced my friends to madebykca‘s semi precious stone jewelry.

Thankful. ♥

Overall, this one was more tiring and challenging. We still had a lot of fun though. We also learned a lot here through experience and advice from fellow bazaar peeps. ♥ For now, the January Makers will take a break to replenish stocks & create more art for future bazaars.

As for me, I have to go back to the interior design world for a while. HUHU. I hope I could still squeeze some time to make more art.

Please follow January Makers PH on Instagram & Facebook. Thank you! ♥

Gawang Kamay PH @ UP Town Center

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The January Girls PH had our first bazaar at Gawang Kamay PH! This has kept me busy for the last few days that I didn’t get to finish the 9th anniversary posts on time. Jean (owner of seamountainco), Monique (food illustrator), and I (floral illustrator) were the only members of the January Girls present who sold our items. I think we did a good job!

Our 1st table set up. ♥

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The bazaar was located at the far end of UP Town Center, at the building with the cinema. Due to miscommunication, we started setting up on Day 2 of the event. We were located near the stage area, so I’m sorry for the blueish colors of the photos. I did try to tweak them in Photoshop though.

Day 1 table set up. ♥ These are my postcards, stickers, and original art!

These are my sticker sets: Rainy Set, Sunny Set 1, Sunny Set 2. ♥ They’re all Cut-it-yourself sticker packs.

My mini stickers. I cut them all myself! It was weirdly relaxing cutting all around the sunflower petals.

On the left side is Monique’s food stickers, postcards, and art prints. ♥ I super love her chichirya set!

On the right side is seamountainco! I bought her Purple Ochre color to add to my seamountainco set. ♥

The stage with the strong blue lights & loud club music. HAHA.

Our “rushed” logo HAHA. Floral wreath is mine. The pretty girl was created by Jean. ♥

 

Overall, it was a really good experience. We learned a lot of things for the next bazaar. We also met a lot of people. I’d like to thank my friends & family who went and supported our event. ♥ Fellow January Girls member Hannah (naks) who went during the 2nd day & helped us with our table.

We decided to change our name to January Makers PH after this bazaar. HAHA. So it would look more professional. Anyway, the next bazaar we applied to was Maker’s Market! Which will be my next post.

Please follow January Makers PH on Instagram & Facebook. Thank you! ♥