New Artist of the Week.

As promised every week we will include a new artist onto our website. This week we are very excited to introduce Alison Ogden who produces charmingly decorated high qualilty porcelain which is both functional and gorgeous. Hand manipulated cast pieces are decorated with a variety of techniques including applied sprigs, resist, slip trailing and underglaze painting. All Alison's work is high fired and finished with a wonderfullly durable craze free glaze making them both practical - dishwasher and microwave safe - and a pleasure to use.

Drawings in clay - a fascination with the details of life inspires the decoration on this work. Each piece is individually made and hand painted. And on top of all that Alison's ceramics are very reasonably priced.

New Artist - One Off Bags

The New Artist to join our illustrious group this week is Chrissy Smith who makes one off bags. All Chrissy's bags are made from Vintage, Retro and Recycled materials. Hand and machine stitching is used to assemble them and they all have magnetic opening and closing clasps. These beautiful bags are fully lined with complemetary material and they often sport a leather handle for durabilitiy.  Chrissy says, "she loves the idea that a disarded piece of fabric or an article of clothing can have new life breathed into it by changing its use.  All my bags are 'one-offs' and therefore unique. So go to: www.cherrypickedforyou.co.uk and check out Chrissy's beautiful creations under Textiles.

New Artist

As promised a new artist a week and this week we are pleased to welcome Jo Sweeting to our illustrious group of craftworkers. Jo trained at Leeds in Fine Art with Sculpture as her discipline. When she completed her degree she went on to study Stonecarving and Lettercarving at the Skeltons Workshop in Ditchling. She now works from her studio in Brighton. Check out her beautiful handcarved alphabet initials on lime or sandstone and her Peace, Joy and Love pebbles handcarved in upper and lower case. A truly brilliant gift for someone special.

New Ceramic Artist - Stacey Manser-Knight

Happy New Year.

I set myself the task of recruiting one new artist to my online gallery: http://www.cherrypickedforyou.co.uk/ and the artist this week is Stacey Manser-Knight. Stacey is a ceramic artist living in Brighton. Stacey's inspiration for her work comes from living by the sea and the rolling countryside of the Sussex Downs. Check out her beautiful dishes which have multi uses such as a salt dish for the dinning table, a ring or earring dish and many other uses besides.The amount of work Stacey puts in to make her ceramics is astonishing. Firstly she throws the red earthenware clay onto a potters wheel and when they have dried to a certain level she coats one side with a white liquid clay slip which has to dry and the process repeated again. This gives Stacey a thin surface to allow her to draw through. Little sculpted items are then added, a thicker clay preparation is piped on to form the raised flowers, toadstalls, birds, etc., and then the pieces are illustrated. The dishes are then fully dried out so they can be fired for the first time. Now she has a strong dry surface she can add colour to the illustrations and cover the whole items with a clear glaze. The ceramics are now fired for a second time. Next, little gold highlights and rims are added in real gold lustre, also 'on-glaze' highlights and details. Finally, they are fired for the third and last time. So you can see each piece is unique. They would make a great present or a beautiful additon to your own home.

New Artist - Katrine Boyten

In my last blog I set myself the task of recruiting one artist each week to my website: www.cherrypickedforyou.co.uk. Last week Katrine Boyten joined our illustrious group. She is a textile artist living in Brighton and mostly works in wall art but also enjoys making smaller pieces. To this end she has created a beautiful range of individually made cards. They really are works of art in their own right and could be framed. Each card has been lovingly made: calico has been painted and stencilled, then motifs have been stitched on and then further machine embroidery has been added. Finally the pieces have been hand stretched and fitted into the apeture of each card. An absolute bargain at £3each. The first set of five got sold immediately and she is now busy working on another set to meet the demand.

Helen Martino, a ceramics artist on the website, has increased her range of quirky pieces. The kiss pots are great for holding flowers as their diameter is narrow.

I have several artists waiting in the wings to come onto the website but as Christmas is looming I and they will be taking a bit of a break - although the website will be fully functioning of course - so watch this space next year where you will see much more talent appear.

Hope you have a great Christmas and New Year.

Setting up my online showcase for designer led handmade products by professional artists.

It has been an exciting year, setting up my online showcase for designer led handcrafted goods. For many years I have been visiting Brighton to go to the Artist Open Houses where exclusive, quirky handmade gifts were on show with the chance to chat to the artists who made them.  When I moved to Brighton from North London  I decided to give up my teaching career and instead indulge my passion for these unique products by setting up a website www.cherrypickedforyou.co.uk to promote professional craftworkers. To get the website exactly how I wanted took a while but I'm pleased with it and hope you like it too. I have so far recruited a dozen artists to join me. A number of them are local to the area; they come from Brighton, Hove, Patcham, Worthing, Ditchling and others are from further afield in Devon, Hampshire, and Cambridge.I am so lucky to live here with the plethora of talented artists on my doorstep but I also make a point of attending craft fairs all over the country forever on the lookout for special pieces of work and cherry picking the best.


I have set myself a target of finding at least one specially talented artist a week and posting their photos and work on my website along wtih the biography so my customers  can see their achievements to date. Keep following my blog to see if I can achieve this.