It's been a sombre week. As I step into the garden, I'm not quite sure what I'm looking for. Permanence, maybe? Timelessness? No – nature shows me something else.
Just as the giant sunflower heads dry, two smaller sunflowers are bursting into bud, tight little knots of fresh green on hairy stems.
It's the birds' moulting season and there's a fledgling feather nestling in the hydrangea. At first glance, it's white but as I sketch, I see the palest blushes of mauve, yellow and blue.
Deeper into the hydrangea, well-watered by days of showers, a fresh pink set of blooms, randomly-shaped and sized, as though after a parched Summer, it can't quite remember how to flower.
And so, I'm reminded that the garden is a place of constant goodbyes and hellos; of continuity.
This week, I'm drawing on the last of the heavily-textured paper so once again, it calls for bold, painterly marks. There's been a bit of ingenuity with the feather, working with an almost-dry brush and a white fineliner.
Ballpen, watercolour and fineliner on handed-down watercolour paper.
Rose sketches from this project are available as greeting cards, from the Garden Museum shop in London and at Hackney Wick Underground.
On my Teemill shop, watercolour and line sketches on t-shirts and tote bags.