Please go see the magazine itself, there are ten pages of beautiful images of the completed job. These are taken in progress as I had limited access to the house with a camera once it was furnished.

We’ll see.

Here.

This is a kitchen hood I painted for Studio One on Reisterstown Road. It is painted in the style of Habersham, (of which I am not much of an admirer, as I find the work lumpy and uncertain, as if they are trying to hide an imperfect understanding of classical form), but that’s what the client wanted, so who am I to snark except in the privacy of my own blog?

This is the spinnaker, which I broke.

This is the briney deep blue sea, wherein there be whales. I saw them.

This is Miami.

This is the splash of a porpoise, following us into harbor. And Glenn.

And THIS is the marina on Stock Island, where I hung in hammocks.

 and with no good reason to hurry home, I stayed through Halloween. It’s the next closest thing to Mardi Gras, apparently.

This is what they mean by “painted lady” around here.

Instead we went via Niagara Falls, then across Canada to the Michigan Upper Penninsula,

and across the Dakotas. Of course we stopped to see the Little House on the Prairie homestead of Laura Ingalls Wilder.

And paused to pose as presidents….

And looked for aliens…..

It has been a dry summer for Rising Tide as far as decorative painting goes, but not for me. I have been on three distinct personal adventures to make up for the general shortness of work around here, beginning with a two week trip in July  to Oregon to visit my family.

This is me at the beach in Bandon. That’s my mom out there picking up rocks and stuff.
 

At the end of my brother’s block in Brookings. 

One of these might be the house I lived in in Portland in 1966. Substantially rebuilt, so my parents are no help.

I also went inside and took pictures of the work Willy and I did inside at the end of ‘07.

This morning was a beautiful warm spring day, perfect to spend outside.

I decided a simple limestone finish would complement the building without calling too much attention to itself, so began with a wash of grey-green-blue in parabolic curves to follow the round structure of the columns.

This was followed by a sponged wash of ivory to add texture, close the contrast range, and to neutralize the chroma of the first wash.

One of the advantages of the limestone choice is that it does not need a sheen, which lends itself well to the exterior usage. The construction is a little bit crude, and the finish will last better if it is allowed to breathe. A sealer coat is an invitation to delamination in the long run, if moisture gets under the film. It is also appropriate for use in front of that EIFS trowelled stone block background.

 Finally I recut the capital and base in a puce tone reminiscent of the anodized bronze vestibule. There will be bronze signage applied in the arch at some point, which will give it a nice rhythm of darks for the eye to follow. 

Subtle, stone-like and unprepossessing. Just like me.

Tomorrow I will touchup and enhance the marble just a bit, and recut the trim in a second coat, and be finished. Yay!

All the gang at Rising Tide took time off from the daily recession and spent a lovely weekend at the beach in Rehoboth, DE. Here we are exercising our extreme hipness.

Too bad I forgot to get pictures of us in the hot tub…..