Carve Out Time — March Print Club: Sunny Sands
Each month, I create a new linocut for my Monthly Print Club, accompanied by a studio letter sharing the process and ideas behind the work.
These posts are a quieter version of those letters — shared here a little later, with less detail, but the same intention: to offer a slower look into the making.
This first print in the series, Sunny Sands, is a view through the arches that line Folkestone’s sandy beach.
I wanted to begin with something hyper-local — coastal, but distinctly Folkestone. The arches felt like the right place to start: framing the sea beyond, with glimpses of the horizon appearing between them.
Printed in a soft pastel blue — a colour that will carry through future designs — this piece begins to explore ideas I return to often: light, reflection, shifting skies, and the rhythm of the coast. As the series develops, this will move into seaweed, coastal botanicals, and birdlife.
Process
This print began with a walk from my studio on The Old High Street down to the beach, gathering reference images along the way — the repetition of the arches, their curves receding into the distance, and the open stretch of sea beyond.
I wanted the piece to feel bold at first glance, with quieter details revealing themselves over time. The sky is built through linework to create a sense of light and openness, while the foreground introduces texture and movement to balance the composition.
The design starts simply: trace, flip, and transfer onto the block in pencil, before refining in pen to prevent smudging.
For this piece, I used six tools — more than I would usually reach for. I recently received a set of Japanese carving tools and wanted to explore their potential.
Among them is the Iris, a beautifully engineered drawing tool by Makers Cabinet, which uses a spiralling mechanism (similar to a camera lens) to create adjustable circles and curves. I used this to map out the arches.
The remaining tools included two small U-gouges for fine detail, a V-tool for sharper lines, and a larger U-gouge to clear space. Each mark is built slowly, layer by layer.
Printing
To ensure consistent alignment, I worked with a block cut to the same size as the paper. A stencil masked the surrounding area to keep edges clean, with tape securing both block and mask so each print registered centrally.
Warmer days ahead
I hope these prints offer a small moment of pause — whether they inspire you to make something yourself, try linocutting, or simply step outside and notice the changing light, the clouds, and the warmer days.
In the Studio
I’ve began work on a new large-scale linocut — an A1 block. After months of development, I arrived at a composition that feels right, refining scale and placement through a series of small test prints.
Creating a miniature mock-up to explore layering and colour proved useful — and a good reminder that lighter colours need to be printed first.
This spring, I visited Collect, The Affordable Art Fair, and The Other Art Fair, which left me feeling incredibly inspired. Printmaking often sits on the fringes of the art world, and I’m interested in how I can bring it more into the foreground locally in Folkestone — through exhibitions, teaching, and conversation.
A highlight was meeting Ian Phillips, a linoprint and woodcut artist, who generously shared insights into materials and process. Conversations like these always stay with me.
If you’d like to receive each print and the full studio letter as it’s released, you can join the Monthly Print Club.
Happy printmaking.