WRITING the labels for our latest batch of jam – Victoria Plum, which we picked from my mum’s tree on Thursday – gave me the perfect excuse to try out another colour from my new set of Winsor and Newton inks to write the labels. The bottle of purple ink has an illustration of a plum on the label but it’s a purple Damson, not a light red Victoria Plum.
This second illustration is drawn with a Q Connect fineliner with an 0.4 tip; an ordinary office pen. Both the Winsor and Newton ink and the ink of the fineliner penetrate to the reverse side of the soft, absorbent cartridge pages of my current sketchbook. I’m looking forward to finishing this sketchbook – a Crawford & Black 96 gsm acid free A5 portrait sketchbook from The Works discount store – and getting back to a more ruggedly made Pink Pig sketchbook but there’s still half the pages to go and I can’t waste them; it’s acceptable for everyday use but I have another sketchbook on the go for when I have a day out drawing.