Preparing for calligraphy workshops makes me so happy! I love writing out participant place cards, arranging little bouquets of flowers, and coming up with curriculum tweaks. On the day of, I arrive early at The Riverside and set up the room to make it comfortable and beautiful. If you are relaxed and in a pleasing environment, I believe that it’s easier to tap into your creativity!
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Last weekend, two cool things happened here in Boulder, Colorado. The first was literally cool: Saturday was a chilly day — in the midst of a slew of warm days — filled to the brim with snow. The second cool thing involved an amazing group of people who braved the snow to come to downtown Boulder to learn calligraphy. I couldn’t have had a better time getting to teach learners at the two TPK beginner calligraphy workshops last Saturday, and I want to sincerely thank everyone who participated!
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I have always loved lettering art because it draws observers in. When you see art that’s made out of words, your natural instinct is to read its message! Creating lettering art also provides you as the maker with a way to focus on a theme. In today’s tutorial, the theme is special memories and shared interests. I’ll explain how to make the project, then provide you with usage ideas for it!
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Three years ago, I decided to try making a calligraphy worksheet. It was the first worksheet that I ever made, and I used a calligraphy style that I called “Flourish Formal”, a style with ample curls and embellishments. Last year, I started to notice just how outdated the worksheet was … it just didn’t measure up to the quality of later worksheet sets, both functionally and aesthetically.
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Faux calligraphy — calligraphy created with any standard writing instrument like a ballpoint pen, chalk, or marker — offers a fantastic introduction to dip pen calligraphy! Additionally, faux calligraphy is a beautiful lettering art form in its own rite. In the first half of this blog post, I’ll teach you how to create this fun, accessible form of calligraphy. In the second half, you’ll find inspiration for using it to add beauty to everything from chalkboards to mail art!
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Over the past few years, I have taught several beginners’ modern calligraphy workshops and answered countless calligraphy questions via email. Those experiences have taught me that there is a need for a blog post like this one: a post that shows you where to start learning from scratch! In this blog post, I’ll walk you through how to learn modern calligraphy in a few simple steps.
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There are already two tutorials over creating watercolor calligraphy on the TPK blog. And yet … this is a topic that I return to again and again because it’s a calligraphy technique that I love so much. The difference between the other watercolor calligraphy blog posts and this one is video capability! Now that I have a video-friendly camera and a tripod with a horizontal arm (initially purchased in order to create the Amy video course), you’ll be seeing a lot more videos in blog posts! Since watercolor calligraphy is really something that is easiest to do once you see how someone else does it, I thought today I’d share a video that will help you to create your own watercolor calligraphy with a dip pen.
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When people ask me what I do — as in, what is my profession — I generally say I am a blogger whose main goal is to help people learn calligraphy, and modern styles in particular. While there are a lot of art and DIY projects mixed in with calligraphy posts, calligraphy and hand-lettering is the lifeblood of TPK. That said, the other day I was examining the blog and trying to look at it from the perspective of someone who has happened upon the website for the first time. In that moment, I realized that even when you conduct a concentrated search {e.g. “learn calligraphy”}, there are a lot of articles, and it’s difficult/overwhelming to choose which one to begin with.
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