Bookmark (2) – Traditional Paints and Finishes

  

… After completing the groundbreaking (and back-breaking) 'Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques' [Bookmarks (1) February 2014],  my publishers in the early 1990s were after the next bestseller, so with Kate Gwynn again designing, I wrote 'Traditional Paints and Finishes' (US title 'Classic Paints and Faux Finishes'.) 

This was a the history and sourcebook of all the different sorts of artisan paints, pigments and colours – a lot about making paint, and less on techniques. Check out the back cover contents below which features shots from my step-by-step stencilling and distressing a cabinet!

Plastered

If I was to pick out a feature I was particular pleased with, it would be the plaster finishes – and I did lots of them. 

Creating the props and effects for this book was a huge task, literally. This was in the days before Photoshop so we made these huge boxes with plaster in them and then I painted them and we shot them. The pic below also show my early infatuation with sgraffito which I’ve also recently blogged about.

There were no computer geeks and graphic designers doing fancy stuff on Macs! You had to make these things. And they were so beautiful, even if they weighed a ton! And the greater shame was that after the photo shoot, we had to throw them away. Anyway, looking back at my first big breaks in publishing I am very, very proud of these early gems.

Absorbed by paint

Researching the history of decorative paints –including limewashing, découpage, fresco and the use of glue size, and old varnishes and waxes, as well as how to make paints from natural pigments – spurred me on to develop my own paints as I became more and more absorbed by what paint is and how it works (and there’s a post to come on that…). It wasn’t about nostalgia, it was "a reaction to the blandness and uniformity of modern paints.”

I was reacting against the standardisation that plastic paints produced. Oil was traditionally the classic paint everybody used, so we did both books using oils – back then I thought it was the only way I could get that translucency. I had by then started to try out my own paints (e.g. early versions of Chalk Paint® in Chateau Grey and Aubusson Blue) and some of these featured in both books.

I suppose, in a modest way, with these two titles I helped kick start the rediscovery of traditional paints and paint effects. The use of many softer and subtler colours allowed novice and more experienced decorators a chance to reclaim the look of earlier times. Some of it will look dated now as fashion in decoration comes and goes (and I have developed more deeper, warmer colours), but the principles and fundamentals hold good. And of course today I have my fabulously versatile Chalk Paint® range so you don’t have to make your own paints from scratch as I had to all those years ago.

You could say that you get my whole history in paint mixing and colour theory in each Chalk Paint® pot!

Yours, Annie

Bookmarks (1)

For those of you who’ve just discovered my paint, Chalk Paint®, and think I might be new on the decorative painting scene (well, there might be some!), let me rekindle the book that really launched me all the way back in 1988.

  

It’s not the finish, it’s the start that counts

But first a bit of background. . . After studying for a degree and a Masters at art college, I moved to a small village in Oxfordshire with a young family, getting commissions from clients to paint murals and other finishes, and running courses and workshops. I learnt on the job, got my hands dirty and experimented with all sorts of weird and wonderful decorative techniques then in vogue – blocking, sponging, ragging, stippling, colourwashing, dragging, combing, flogging, spattering, marbling, tortoiseshellling, woodgraining, gilding, stencilling, and sgrafitto, to name a few. . . 

I relied on my art training, my passion for colour, my unceasing enthusiasm to experiment with different pigments and finishes, and a lot of trial and error. Having extensively researched the history and application of decorative painting, I realised that for such a wide subject there were very few accessible books around. That changed, as did my fledgling career, when I sat down to write The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques.

This is me being presented to my new readership for the first time inside The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques. I was still learning my trade. 

No flash in the pan

This exhaustive (and exhausting) title was my first published book, back in 1988. I’m pleased to say the result were well worth it: The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques sold in the hundreds and thousands, was translated into 13 languages, and it really launched 'Annie Sloan'. 

Looking back on it now, I am still amazed at how comprehensive it was. I especially like the colour inspirations with the strong blues (see page extract below), reds, and greens etc.. These show how my background in colour – and hence part of this blog’s title – goes back such a long way. I also loved putting the objects and materials together to be shot – creating these montages for inspiration – long before the days of Photoshop!

My co-author, Kate Gwynn, had a design and print background and went to the London College of Printing. She understood how you put a book together – not just the visuals but the presentation of written material and information with images. At the time, it was very new to me. This is Kate (below) in the book.

Kate and I lived in the same Oxfordshire village and her husband Stanley Smith was a painter at the Royal College of Art. He knew that Mobius – a newly set up book packager (production company) at the RCA – were looking to produce a new title. So that’s how the whole thing started (you can see Mobius’s input on the imprint page below).

Many of the interiors shown in the book were mine, such as this kitchen scene (below). We begged and borrowed all the other house settings. 

In pages like these and below I can see both my apprenticeship on show, but also something of the direction I was to take – and a bit of my personality starting to come through.

Blockbusters

We did the book using oil paint, because that’s traditionally the paint everybody used. Back then I thought it was the only way I could get that translucency. It may look a bit dated now – and fashions change – but I’m still tremendously proud of it. 
The ‘Blocking’ section (below), for example, is really ‘me’ and very jolly and done with artists' water based paint acrylic paints. 

As is this tree print project (below) for the kids’ playroom, and yes I did use real pears and swedes.

Colour all the way
One innovative feature we added to this book was the use of colourways at the edge of every right hand page in the ‘Basic Finishes’ section. Here’s an example using Dragging. . . 

This helped us get over people’s common objections to a particular technique based on colour i.e. “I don’t like that because it’s in yellow”. By showing a finish in other colours we could overcome those barriers. 

My back pages
Researching and writing The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques and its success meant a sequel was needed (which I’ll post about soon). It also spurred me on to develop my own paints as I became more and more absorbed by what paint is and how it works. 

So looking back over a quarter of a century of apprenticeship, application and experimentation (when many of my stockists hadn’t even been born!) you can see that Annie Sloan and Chalk Paint® come with a history, a heritage.

Chalk Paint® can applied to so many techniques – its versatility is the name of the game – and it’s as versatile as my approach to painting. With Chalk Paint® you'll find my whole history of mixing and colour mixing . . . in a pot. 

Yours, Annie