If you missed the excitement last week, then you had the pleasant luxury of NOT hearing me squeal so loud the whole country probably heard me…but hey, that’s okay—because I’m back squealing again today!!
See, in just 11 more days, the Galaxy Collection will be dropping here at Jaded Studios. I have literally been dreaming of releasing this collection for the better part of this year, and got the kick in the butt I needed to start working on it. Ironically, it was needing down time for me that got me there—because almost everything in this collection is a hand painted piece by yours truly, and my “down time” involves a whole lot of pleasant watercolor painting time. 😊
Today, I’m thrilled to be sharing a couple sneak peeks, plus some dirty details about what actually goes into all these little pieces. If you happened to set your eyes on my galaxy ornaments from last winter, or even my galaxy bookmarks, you might have caught on that I really love the looseness of watercolor painting versus my traditional calligraphy work, and I particularly love painting galaxies. I’ve always been a star child, and have many fond memories of my father taking me to the Planetarium when I was a little girl. Let’s just say the stars is one of a few natural influences on all of my work. (The other is anything sea or ocean-based, which you might just find more of from me in the future.)
So let’s start with some of the new cuties joining the shop on 10/13. I am pleased to announced first that I will be massively replenishing the collection of both galaxy ornaments and galaxy bookmarks. Bonus, I am going to be offering the ornaments in even more sizes this year—I just couldn’t help myself, because, as it turns out, I really love painting watercolor on wood. I might even love it more than painting on paper!
These three ornaments are just a few of the styles you’ll find on the 13th, and I had so much fun painting each of these! My galaxy ornaments are set on wood slices, so the wood itself is first treated with watercolor ground, which creates a paper-like absorbency on the surface. Next, I set about creating these babies. While they are each individually painted, I tend to be a little machine-like when I paint (said my former watercolor teacher). That is, I like to paint several at a time, and I’ll bounce between each of them splashing reds on this one, blues on that one, and so on. I think it’s less that I’m a machine and rather, I love multitasking! Whatever the case, each ornament takes about 3-4 rounds of watercolor layering before I come back in to add the stars. That involves a whole lot of literal splashing of paint before I touch up individual stars with a fine tipped paintbrush, pulling the whole image together.
Finally, after they’ve had time to fully dry for a few days, the ornaments are treated with several layers of a protective aerosol coating to help preserve their pigments. This also adds a very subtle shimmer to some of the colors, and provides a layer of UV protection, as watercolor is a fragile medium in sunlight. These ornaments are thus perfect decorations for indoors—for hanging from your mantle, off the edge of a desk, on a wall, and especially as we approach the holidays, from your tree or holiday wall displays. They make excellent birthday and holiday gifts for artists, art lovers, and anyone who loves space or the stars, and are a particularly big hit with children and teens. (I may have shown a couple to a few teenagers I know, who possibly inspired several of the variations coming with this collection. Just you wait!)
I will have more to share soon about several related watercolor wood slice goodies coming out with the Galaxy Collection, but, hello, I can’t spoil you now with all the news in one day. 😉
Instead, I’m going to share another exciting part of this release that I’ve been itching to tell you about… Long ago, I painted six galaxies with the intent of turning them into paper prints and goods at some point. Well, the Galaxy Collection is finally going to contain these pretties! My six original watercolor paintings have been turned into a set of square cards that I cannot wait to share with you. There are also a few more paper goodies releasing with the Collection that feature these galaxy paintings—but I’ll tell you more about those as we get closer. For now, take a gander at one of my favorites in the set, “Fire & Brimstone”:
I tend to prefer painting in blues and greens, but holy moly, did I love getting into the fire colors of this one!
Like my other greeting cards, the Galaxy Card Set is professionally printed on lush, beautiful matte paper that not only allows the colors of the galaxies to pop, but is archival grade, allowing your cards to wait for a later use as needed while maintaining their color qualities. My velvety smooth cards are acid free and printed with durable, dye-based ink. Needless to say, this makes all six galaxies you’ll find stunning in card form, so I can’t wait for you to see the whole set—or the related products for that matter!
If you aren’t already following Jaded Studios on Instagram, make sure you are, as I’ll be posting previews of goodies to come as we get closer to the big release. I feel like the universe has been telling me to get on this collection for so long, that I am seriously giddy about finally putting it out there…into the universe! 😊
Thank you so much for reading about the creation of these new items to come, and I hope you’ll join me on October 13th when the Galaxy Collection drops!
XO,
Jade
Updated: The Galaxy Collection has arrived! All items in the Galaxy Suite are available now in The Galaxy Collection.
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