When Fashion and Nature Collide – Hearts and Flowers February 2019.

artyplantsman, ,

This is my February 2019 contribution to our special project: When Fashion and Nature Collide

You had a preview of our very Valentine’s themed collection last week, on the 14th. My own new artwork contribution this month has been limited to the Heart/Strawberry so I thought I would go over that. Plus a couple of themed flowers!

Lisa, on the other hand, has been working away generating lots of new images and preparing all our work for the Threadless shop. Dominique has been generating ideas like crazy and organising having prototypes printed for modelling. It has been a busy month!

We are very excited to be able to offer several of these new designs on our Fashioned By Nature shop.

These flowers  have provided the inspiration for Dominique‘s styling and Lisa’s art this month. Please go and visit their own blogs and see their posts. Collages used here were prepared by Dominique.

The Happy Trio.png

Psychotria elata


Fashion Inspiration by 3C Style,, collages compiled by 3C Style & Lisa & artwork by Lisa.  Photos of 3C Style by Annie Gaudreau

Confession time. I had never heard of this plant before Dominique told me about it and found this photo. So the info below is gleaned from various sources rather than from personal experience. To be honest, the thing that I like most (apart from the model) about the above collage and outfit is that gorgeous red coat!

This is a tropical rainforest shrub from Central and South America and is now quite endangered. The actual flowers are in the white area between those two red bracts which resemble human lips, hence the common name ‘Hot Lips’. It can be cultivated given tropical conditions in a glasshouse. The flowers are fragrant and pollinated by butterflies, resulting in a blue berry being produced.

Lamprocapnos spectabilis


Fashion Inspiration by 3C Style, 3CStyle photo by Annie Gaudreau. Strawberry Heart concept by 3C Style, drawn by Darren, Lettering by Lisa.
Artwork Copyright: ©Fashioned by Nature – LismorePaper, 3C Style and The ArtyPlantsman.

This used to be known as Dicentra spectabilis, or more commonly as ‘Bleeding Heart’. Originating from Asia this has been a very popular garden plant for generations and deservedly so. If anything, the pure white form is even more beautiful.

Often these are still regarded as belonging to the genus Dicentra, which in turn is closely allied to the Corydalis I featured last week.

I grow a number of other Dicentra. The white or pale pink D. canadensis, the similar D. cucullata and a few of the hybrids such as ‘King of Hearts’ and ‘Burning Hearts’ which are amongst those you can see here in my spring border, and which can sometimes be quite invasive:

Blooming Heart

This design was created by Lisa from another concept of Dominique’s. Lisa is great at giving new lives to my drawings by combining them with her own fantastic work. For the right hand heart Lisa used flowers extracted from my Moraea artwork, which has featured before but which you can see again here. This has now been scanned properly and I aim to have prints of this available as soon as my bank account magically refills after paying for my exhibition framing!


Sweet Heart – Strawberry art.

Fashion Inspiration by 3C Style, 3CStyle photos by Annie Gaudreau. First collage by Lisa, others by 3C Style. Artwork Copyright: ©Fashioned by Nature – LismorePaper, 3C Style and The ArtyPlantsman.

I am very fond of this concept. I liked it even more when I saw the results of Dominique’s photo shoot. I could hear her laugh when I saw the picture with the pineapples!

Dominique had several ideas for this concept, all of which I liked. The wonders of digital image manipulation meant that I was able to potentially complete all the options.

I started with the middle, full, strawberry as this was common to each concept and gave me an anchor. After this I added the half, strawberry at the right.

At this point time was growing short so my next option was to take the quickest route so that Dominique could get her prototype T-shirt printed for the photo shoot. Lisa was already working on the lettering.

So what I did was to trace the outline of the middle strawberry onto another piece of paper, add leaves to it and scan this separately. Then it was a matter of digitally copying the middle strawberry to the left hand side and adding these leaves.

Then Lisa’s ‘Sweet Heart’ lettering was added for the T-shirt version you can see in the collage and on the 3C Style blog.

After this I returned to the original piece of paper and added a third image on the left hand side, based on another of Dominique’s ideas:

I rather like this version too and we are talking about offering it somehow, maybe as an art print?

Coming soon… Join us in March to celebrate our first anniversary!

Published by artyplantsman

Frustrated artist and plantsman from Northern England

30 Comments

  4. You know, that strawberry collage is just amazing! 😍

    One of my favourite flowers is the Bleeding Heart (sorry, I always use the common names… Not very scientific I know). There is something just so special about the design of those tiny flowers… The kissing flower was a new one for me😃.

    Great collaboration. 👌💞

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  5. I love this months collaboration. Love when the three of us work on a piece together. You are amazing talented my friend. You and Do are such a blessing. The strawberry art is so incredible. Thank you for your amazing spirit, Darren. Much love and hugs!

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    1. Lisa my friend, you are so lovely. I agree – when all three of us have an input it makes those pieces extra enjoyable. I love you for your talent and your positivity Lisa. Bless you😊💕 and thank you for your friendship. Love and hugs!

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  6. I always struggle to point out various parts of these posts because I just love so much of them. The drawings, collaboration, flowers, and fashion. It all melds together so nicely. I’m off to see what Lisa and Dominique have done on their versions. Hugs!

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    1. Thank you Linda. You have always been so supportive of us as a team and also as individuals. You rock!
      Hope you enjoy the other two posts. I think we have three very different posts this month but I am going to have a look too😊💕

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  8. Darren, your artwork just blow me away! You already know how much I love your Moraea drawing but the strawberries are equally amazing. I love both versions. You have done a fabulous job in such a short amount of time. It is so nice to learn about the making of your pieces. And yes, these should make an art print. I agree with you and Lisa – when the three of us work on a piece together it makes them extra special. Love you both so much! You are both so inspiring, fun and creative. xoxo

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    1. Thank you Dominique. If it were not for your ideas I would still be doing quite formal botanical art and I love that you are encouraging my more playful side. We all benefit hugely from the collaborative process. Love you both too! Dxx

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      1. I like both sides of you, the formal side and the sugar coating one! You are amazing. And yes the collaborative process is inspiring and so much fun. You and Lisa mean the world to me. xoxo

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    1. Thank you!

      I enjoyed bringing Dominique’s vision to life. It is a very different experience in comparison with drawing what is in my own mind.

      The hardest thing for me was scale. Generally botanical art is done life size but this needed to be drawn around 5x bigger than life for the resolution to be high enough for printing.

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  11. As always I’m in total awe of your drawings and paintings, Darren! The strawberries are just stunning and look so real I want to grab them from my screen and stuff them into my mouth! 😉 And the Moraea painting is just so wonderful!
    I’ve never seen those ‘hot lips’ before – they look awesome! And like you I find that coat just spectacular! 😀
    My mum had those bleeding hearts when I was a kid but not anymore. I remember how fascinated I was by their form and beauty.
    Another wonderful collaboration of the three of you! 😀 ❤

    Liked by 1 person

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