Graphic | A Zestful Quest

The sun is shining through my window, there’s a storm outside and I can see the trees swing from side to side. Still holding on to their already turning leaves, but it won’t last much longer I’m afraid… The day will come where shades of red, yellow and brown will colour the ground. The season is changing, I’m lucky to catch this ray of sunshine on what would usually be a typical English grey day. It’s probably one of the last attempts so I’m a sponge absorbing the nurturing ingredients of sunlight making me dreamy while I prepare myself for a day of creativity.

Yesterday and the day before I decided to stay away from my computer for a while because I felt the urge to be quiet and think. I’m good at reorganising my thoughts while I’m cleaning up at the same time. Throwing out all the things that ‘you think you need‘ gives me the freedom of detaching so I can let go and therefore it creates the much needed space in my head to deal with things that might be bothering me. A declutter session is like spending an hour with a shrink, and after, you feel relieved and determined to deal with what needs to be dealt with.

So because of those sessions, today, I enjoy the sunshine warming up and lighten the now empty corners of my mind while I focus on things that need to be done. Stuff that I might have postponed for another day or worse; try not to deal with them at all. I have a perfectly clean slate, a nice crisp page in my Moleskine sketchbook, a leadholder impatiently waiting to jot down thoughts accompanied by sketches and the in-between-thoughts doodles that will cause laughter days later when I go through my sketchbook in search of another unspoilt page.

I will use the wonderful skills that I was given, the creative knowledge that I’ve studied for and gathered over many years of experience to create business cards for a garden designer and a website for my friend. She is a [wedding] photographer and asked me a few days ago if I was interested in this project. I designed her logo, stationery, business cards and compliment slip using her beautiful pictures. She needs an online portfolio to show her clients, I’ll use the same design as I used for her stationery: stylish, classy and most of all professional looking.

It’s a website that will be so much fun to design, I’ll do this in the ‘quiet moments’ as a treat to myself when I’m allowed a break from the gloves website which is just one of those things that needs to be done… Getting paid for sitting in the sun and being creative… ain’t it fun? *kidding*

[Note: an hour later it pisses down with rain *LOL* but I’m happy I could enjoy enough sunshine to brighten my morning. And two hours later the sun is there again smiling at me for the rest of the day!]

My notes, thoughts, doodles and/or sketches…

I went to an amazing place last Sunday: the British Library, near St Pancras tube station. I wanted to see a temporary exhibition called ‘The Printed Face of the European Avant Garde 1900-1937’. It was nice but I guess I have seen most of the printed books, posters, record covers and brochures at exhibitions in the Lowlands already. One thing was quite funny: ‘de Stijl’ was one of the subjects of the exhibition as part of the Avant Garde. Each subject was linked to the city of origin. So the first thing I noticed when I walked in was my own place of birth ‘Leiden’ printed in huge block capitals followed by ‘Amsterdam’. I have to admit I had this funny feeling all of a sudden. It’s just weird to see such a familiar name in such an unfamiliar place.

The other section is a permanent exhibition where you can find books, manuscripts, maps, sound recordings, photographs and stamps. Examples are the Magna Carta, Alice’s Adventures Under Ground by Lewis Carroll, Shakespeare’s First Folio of works, the Gutenberg Bible and Mozart’s music scores along with some other scores of great composers. I was sneaking a few pictures when I was told off by the security guard so my camera ended up in my handbag. I think this part of the British Library was the most interesting part to be honest. I love to see all the old handwritten books, the thick paper, the beautiful bright colour illustrations in the bibles and manuscripts. It’s a shame that I wasn’t allowed to take pictures because these really are wonderful treasures.

Another part that caught my eye was the King’s Library: a glass tower of books at the heart of the British Library. The private collection of George III, King of Great Britain and Ireland from 1760 to 1820. The Tower is designed by Colin St John Wilson, architect of the St Pancras building. Possibly inspired by a similar tower at Yale University in the United States. It has six levels all linked by one internal staircase and two lifts. All book cases are on rollers so they can easily be pulled back to allow access. The books are kept in a controlled environment with a temperature of 16º C [61º F] and 50% relative humidity. The Tower houses the King’s Library and the private library of the politician Thomas Grenville, about 105000 volumes in total.

The King’s Library Collection compromises around 85000 volumes, mostly books and pamphlets with smaller numbers of periodicals, maps and atlases some of which are manuscript dated from the 1450s to the 1830s. Almost all printed in Europe or America. Much of the material is in English or Latin, but many other languages are well represented especially Greek, Dutch, French, German, Italian and Spanish.