Sketches / Kate Moss at the Beach with Two Cigs in Gouache and Pencil

Made some sketches while pursuing Tumblr the other night from a photo of Kate Moss on the beach.
Gouache and pencil on extremely shitty paper that I bought on vacation in Beijing.

Here's a detail shot, I like the texture. I always like to draw everyone with very Asian looking eyes.

This little beauty is for sale: $100 CAD. She's about 10" x 7", pencil and gouache on paper. Original painting.
Email me if you're interested: kitty.n.wong (at) gmail (dot) com

I have two weddings to go to next year, and they're both so far away. So I'm going to be selling some more drawings and paintings soon to try to save up for them. Keep your eyes out for originals on my Etsy shop. And the signed framed prints from the Shoes / Off shows are listed there too.

www.etsy.com/shop/themarrow

Tutorial / How to Fake that Chalkboard Look on Photoshop + Champagne Blending Illustration for Tatler HK

How to get a realistic chalk effect on Photoshop.
This trick looks more like chalk than CaCO₃, I learned it from a Jessica Hische talk. Speaking of which, talks and podcasts by creative people are the only way I survive while working since I spend 8+ hours drawing by myself, my sanity is just hanging on by threads. My absolute favourite lately is Your Dreams My Nightmares by artist / educator Sam Weber, he interviews illustrators and art directors and it fulfils all my podcast listening fantasies: weird music, cool people, talking about minute things only illustrators care about, NYC!

Anyways back to this tutorial, it really is super easy.

- Using a 2B or darker pencil draw the words or pictures you want on a piece of paper (bond paper is fine).
- Smudge it all around with your hands, that's why you need a 2B pencil, any harder and it ain't messy enough.
- Touch all your belongings and make everything dirty. 
- Scan the paper and open it up on Photoshop.
- Invert the image so the white part becomes black and voila! Finally play around with the levels until you're happy with the black to white ratio.

Here's one of my latest illustrations for HongKongTatler.com for their article on champagne blending where I used this chalkboard technique. Uh huh huh, I had a tres bien time drawing that French man.

Thanks to the editor Charmaine and the writer Esther.

If Fashion Week was a Horror Film / My Halloween Fashion Comic for Dazed & Confused

It feels surreal but my very first illustration feature with Dazed Digital is out now, they're the online companion to Dazed & Confused magazine. I used to buy secondhand copies of i-D and Dazed magazines at the huge BMV bookstore in downtown Toronto during 1st year university and I used to leaf through them thinking how cooool are all these people? And then I'd carefully cut out my favourite pages and save them for collaging, but after 1st year university I ran out of money and stopped buying magazines and just bought food instead.

So needless to say I'm super excited to be working with Dazed for this Halloween feature, "If Fashion Week was a Horror Film". 

There are 5 storyboards, with each image being it’s own story about the designer and their dark S/S 2014 collection:

1. Rei Kawakubo and her Commes des Garcons girl gang.
2. Marc Jacobs's Louis Vuitton circus.
3. The Maison Martin Marigela laboratory.
4. Meadham Kirchhoff's heaven and hell.
5. Thom Browne's mental asylum.

You can read more about the story and the illustrations on DazedDigital.com.

Click through after the jump to see my drafts and process for the project.

This Month I've Been: the Very Best October, Vancouver, Toronto, Canada Edition

Picking berries and frolicking on lush carpets of grass at my old neighbour's backyard in my B.C. hometown. Oh Canada, I've missed you so much. It's already been three years since I graduated and moved back to Hong Kong, I can't believe just how fast time flies.

Next I stopped by Vancouver fashion designer Jason Matlo's studio in Gastown, he took a chance on me when I was just a super green first year student at Ryerson and I interned there for the summer. I'm still super grateful for the experience. He also makes amazing chicken salads. I made this sketch of his White Cashmere collection as a little present when I went to visit.

And what is a day in Vancouver without the VAG? That's right, the VAG, the Vancouver Art Gallery. And also the gay village on Davie St. where this rainbow sidewalk was.

Speaking of stripes, my lovely friend Phoebe in Taiwan just ordered the Stripes in Shibuya iPhone case? Doesn't it look so cute? Get yours at my Society6 store.

My family and I did a 5 day trip to Banff, it was ah-mazing, I forget how beautiful Canada is sometimes. Every second was a perfect photo opportunity and the clear mountain air was better for my skin than any facial.

Then it was off to the land of cool cafes and wonderful friends, Toronto, my very first love. Having a delicious yogurt parfait at the beautifully restored Dineen Coffee.

But this vacay isn't all lounging and lattes, my friend Markus and I organized an exhibition of my illustration work that opened while I was there. We did tons of preparing and promoting after I landed. Even walked all around Queen St. West and Kensington posting up flyers and chatting with stores in the area. The show is on until November 10th at Cafe Pamenar, so feel free to drop by!

After all that hustlin' we needed some R'andR', so it was off to the country to my friend Markus's childhood home where his lovely mom made us delicious food and 4 kinds of pies and we spent the weekend lazily watching House Hunters with his awesome family and various pets.

Toronto is so lovely and full of friends, I stayed in Harbord Village near the Annex and kept bumping into friends on the street. Hong Kong can be so lonely sometimes and maybe because Toronto is my alma mater city but it just feels so cozy, I didn't want to leave. 

Postcards I printed for the exhibition opening, I'm all sold out except one last pack of the Shoes I Never Wear series (Email me if you would like that last one - $20CAD for 5 postcards). I'll be doing another print run soon to sell at the Tangram Gift Shop pop-up coming this Christmas. Keep your ears peeled for that.

On my last day in Toronto, we walked down to the Drake hotel on West Queen West and did the chemical photobooth there. Only $2! So worth it. I try to do a photobooth in every city I visit, so far I have Taipei, Korea and now Toronto too.

Toronto is such a creative city, passed by this beautifully illustrated poster for the Fringe play Fort Isabel by Anna Standish.

And lastly, for some super exciting end of the month news! I've been working hard on an illustrated Halloween story for Dazed & Confused magazine! It's so cool to work with such creative people. The piece comes out online tomorrow morning, I can't wait!