Thatch Cottage, Hartlip – The Full Monty

The colour scheme was a no brainier.  This cottage has a lot of whitewashed areas, so is screaming out to be painted in the key of purple cool, with transparent yellow, French ultramarine and quinacridone magenta.  Cadmium red and cadmium yellow were planned all along to be invited for cameo appearances in the flower basket, and the white gel pen made a rare appearance at the end.

I started by putting down pencil outlines, and then reserved some whites and spattered over some masking fluid, which I thought might give a rustic feel.

The first paint down was the sky, as usual.  After that I worked from back to front but in a series of washes  intended to gradually build up colour.  My first layer, rather than being a fast and loose Peter Cronin underpainting, was quite a careful one, accurately mapping out shapes.  After that, my.triple layers went on until I was happy with everything.

The final stages were the addition of the flower baskets with some cadmium red and yellow flowers, the removal of the masking fluid and some tiny finishing touches.  Most of the finishing touches were with the white gel pen on the public footpath sign (which had blended into the greenery behind it) and on s9me highlights around the chimneys to bring them forward ahead of the trees.

The best things about this one were the thatched roof, the car in the bottom right, the hanging baskets, the shadows and the colours on the white wall facing the sun.  Less successful were the boring building on the left, the chimney on the left that is part of Hatch Cottage but which I deliberately understated and the flower pot in the bottom left, which I probably should have left out.

Still, I rate this as successful and it did indeed sell.