Beach Hut - A Different Project 2016 and ongoing

The year 2016 we (joint family venture) purchased a brand new beach hut, located in the popular and upcoming Pakefield development just below the Jolly Sailors public house. So, we had a bare wooden hut that resembled a garden shed and was open without many restrictions to decorate how we pleased.

The Design

Inspiration for the design of the hut was the surrounding area and where the hut is located. Natural colours of the sea, beach and grass verges became the focal point of design with a starting palette of white to give movement to add to or possibly change in the future.

The beach, seagull footprints.

Colours

The Seagull

The base colour white was a great blank canvas to paint some characters on, inspired by the recent beach hut sign design created through my work I decided to paint a seagull on the back which is visible from the Jolly Sailors public house.

View from the top

Spot the seagull...

The Name

Deciding on a name is a tricky business in the beach hut community. Having a walk along the promenade there are many lovely ideas but we wanted something unique to our hut. After the painting of the seagull on the rear of the hut we felt it would be nice to incorporate this into the name, eventually (after much deliberation) we decided to call our hut Sea Gu11 (the ll's of seagull are represented as the number 11 as our hut is in fact number 11!)

We then added some stripes on the front of the doors, as this is a stable door design we decided to reflect the colours of the sea and sky with blues on the top section with the sandy beach yellows on the bottom section.

The Interior

The colours of the outside have been carried on in the inside. We even made a clock and painted that the same colours. The whole hut has been boarded out, painted white and wooden floor laid. It is an ongoing project with bits adding to it while still trying to use it as a relaxing day by the beach (and not working on it all the time).  

The Mural

Enjoying the hut can take over from actually working in the hut; it has tea making facilities and when the British weather is good (which can be hit and miss), it is nice to take advantage for some relax time. The next thing to do is finish the windows and paint the mural planned for the inside of the door with a nice beach scene, as you can see the background has been painted but it still needs the design painted but this will hopefully be completed in the next few weeks (in-between work painting). 

From Start to Finish

So thats the start and I will add to this post in the future once the hut is completely finished!

The new Seagull birthday card has been reproduced from the actual seagull on the hut!

Liza Cole,

Founder and Designer, Liza J design

July 2019

Resident Artist - Primary School Project, Poppy Mural 2014/15

Last November 2014 it was 100 years since the Great War, around this time I was asked if I could create a large Poppy Mural for the local Primary School so they could get the children involved in remembering and learning about the significance of this piece of history.

The mural was an ongoing project, of which took us into the beginning of 2015, I have now got around to writing about it as it has now been officially opened and the ribbon cut (my myself!)

I thoroughly enjoyed working on such a large scale project, it reminded me how Liza J design first came about; as large scale mural work was always my passion before I came up with an economic way of sharing my work through the postal system to customers! It was also very rewarding working with the children throughout the whole school years doing art and watching them taking great care over their poppy art.

Official Mural Opening

Ceremony ceremony of the Poppy Mural at the local Primary School

May 22nd 2015

Pictured - the children who helped paint the mural. Some of the school children wore their Brownies and Scouts uniforms and during the ceremony read a passage from "We Shall Keep the Faith" to reflect on why the school mural was created.

The Project

Leading up to the 100 year anniversary, children within their classes were asked to paint a picture of a poppy or scene to depict the Great War. With over 400 pupils, there was a lot of pictures to look through when I initially visited the school! After browsing through all the pictures, I was given the task of selecting those that I felt could be inspiration for a large wall mural, approximately 8-10 pictures were chosen from each class. After looking at the children's work, and given only one specified request (to paint the local church on the mural) and three large boards to fit into the designated space; an idea started to form!

Poppies

Example of the poppy paintings,

left - Reception (age 5), right -Year 4 (age 9)

Some of the children had painted scenes rather than individual poppies; this gave inspiration for the backgrounds of the three large canvas boards; so three different styles of children's work were copied and painted by myself onto the boards. It soon became apparent looking at the three styles that there was a darker scene, a mild scene and a brighter more cheerful scene; I used this idea as the initial concept when choosing what individual poppy paintings would suit onto each board.

The church and memorial stone that was required and given in the brief I painted onto the 'dark' board. Then gradually I looked through the individual poppy paintings and chose those that I felt would be better placed onto each board, for example some children had painted darker poppy's using black outline and gold centres, these suited the dark board. After choosing a few poppy paintings for each board at a time and roughly sketching the outline of them into position onto the board, those children who's poppy's had been picked were gathered from their classrooms and invited to re-paint their poppy straight onto the large board.

Children painting their poppy's onto the large scenes - images taken from school website

The development of each board and what it represents

The project commenced late November 2014 and took several sessions to complete during the term time until the Christmas break. I returned in January 2015 in between working on customer orders to complete a forth board.

Board One - Darkness of the War

Board Two - Transition of the War, calmer days ahead

Board Three - The War is over, brighter days ahead

Board Four - Artists own design

The final board contained the words supplied in the brief to commemorate the mural. As I hadn't painted one poppy onto the large mural I decided to write the words around my own poppy design.

I thought the children within the school throughout the years took such care and pride in painting their own poppy's onto the large scale piece and hopefully (after a final varnish) the mural will stand pride of place within the school grounds for many years!

Liza Cole,

Founder and Designer, Liza J design 

July 2015