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These weekends are designed for those wanting to learn and improve their general drawing and painting skills and really get stuck into a subject or medium from start to finish. Each weekend course takes the essential elements from each medium and distils them for a deep-dive. There will demonstrations and advise on some quirky techniques and all the notes from the 6-week course are included so you’ll leave with a complete understanding of your chosen medium. Suitable for beginners and skilled artists alike, if you can’t make the whole weekend you can book half the course and come for a single day. As usual on my courses, I'm very happy for you to paint step-by-step with me or go completely off-piste, enjoy the camaraderie and get as much input and advice as you need.

COURSE DATES: 10am-4pm Saturday and Sunday. Please contact Kate to find out more and express your interest for 2025.

COST: £260 for each weekend (single days can be booked at £135) includes homemade biscuits, cake plus tea & coffee. Please let me know of any food allergies when booking.

Art Essentials Weekend Topics

Essentials for Drawing
Line, shapes, angles, proportion, hard/soft edges, tone - noticing shift, shading, pattern, texture, erasing.

Essentials for Acrylic Painting
Colour, blocking a base, tonal balance, composition, details, tools for brushstrokes, layering and glazing.

Essentials for Oil Painting
Dark to light, sketching with paint, blocking areas of tone, limited palette, building with texture, tonking, final marks.

Essentials for Watercolours
Planning from light to dark, masking/reserving, 3 essential washes, water content, lifting out, layering, fine details to finish, sharpening edges.

Essentials for Pastels
Transferring an image, blocking and blending areas of tone, layering colour, texture and fine marks.

Art Essentials Weekend Outline

Saturday - Brief introduction to each other and to the drawing materials or paints, brushes, supports and papers, palettes etc. Teaching and/or a demonstration of techniques along with choosing the right tools for the job. There will be tea, coffee and other refreshments available. After lunch you can draw or paint whatever you choose so please bring your own reference photos or still life objects. There will be plenty of time to discuss your own artwork and more refreshments in the afternoon.

Sunday - Recap on yesterday, Q&A session followed by more teaching and a relevant demonstration. Time to work on your own projects with as much or as little help as needed. Around 3.30pm we will stop for coffee and cake, along with a summary and critique.

For more information on each weekend course’s content, please refer to the individual introduction courses on my website - typically sessions 1-3 will be covered on Saturday and 4-6 on Sunday but I always tailor these courses to suit individual needs, skill levels and interests.

Materials List

Bring with you any drawing/painting materials you have that are relevant to the weekend - please see material lists on other course pages on this website for extra ideas. Saturday morning we will talk briefly about materials and tools for the job. For the painting weekends I recommend A4-size (or preferably bigger) paper or canvas boards; artist quality paints*; a board, easel or table easel to lean on; a Staywet palette for acrylics; a wooden or tear-off palette for oils; a plate or plastic palette for watercolours; a selection of appropriate brushes (rounds, a rigger, a wide flat for washes, fan brush**); palette knives for oils and acrylics; jars for water and/or Zest-it thinner; HB or 2B pencils; charcoal; eraser; kitchen towel; apron; baby wipes; pictures for inspiration. Please wear old clothes.

Photos of the courses in 2023

** For brushes I particularly recommend Rosemary & Co's Shiraz, Ivory and Red Dot ranges. Please ask to see the catalogue and the brushes I use as they are all great quality at reasonable prices and they last! There is a basic set of acrylic brushes that Rosemary & Co. put together for me. Please enquire if you would like a set before the course starts so I can order them in. 

* When buying paints it is always prudent to buy from quality manufacturers as cheap, student or academy quality paints can put you off the medium before you have even started. I would recommend buying professional or artist’s quality tubes from: Winsor & Newton, Daler Rowney (Cryla or System 3 are good for acrylics), Sennelier, Golden or Liquitex. You will only need a small range of colours and they should include a warm and cool version of each of the three primaries ie. Cadmium Red, Crimson Red, Cadmium Yellow, Lemon Yellow, Ultramarine Blue, Cerulean Blue, plus Titanium White and Mars Black. You may also wish to add in some pre-mixed colours like Sap Green or Hookers Green, if you like painting landscapes or Flesh Tint if you want to paint people. Some of the earth colours like Raw Umber and Burnt Umber, Yellow Ochre, Raw Sienna and Burnt Sienna are also useful to have in your paintbox.

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