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Tuckamore Design is a very small handcrafted card and print company based in Buffalo, New York. I'm a Canadian transplant, originally from Newfoundland. I've been a printmaker for 15 years, almost as long as I've been an architect. I never formally studied art, but I've taken classes from a handful of amazing artists at Dundarave Print Workshop in Vancouver, BC, and NSCAD in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

I love paper, especially since I spend a lot of hours every day working on a computer for my other business, Design Synergies Architecture.

I also love to create handcrafted greeting cards for everyday and seasonal occasions. When the inspiration hits (and I have time), I make the occasional original print. Every piece is printed by hand or on an etching press.

In the early days, my prints and cards were featured at the Canadian Craft Museum, the Craft Association of British Columbia shop, and various exhibits in Vancouver and Halifax. My cards have been sold in shops in the Maritime Provinces, Buffalo, NY, and most recently in Martinsburg, West Virginia! Through my Etsy site, my cards have been sent all over the world.

My work is influenced by Celtic and Art Nouveau design, by Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, and by the Arts & Crafts movement. I found inspiration for several years in my front porch container garden in the Elmwood Village in Buffalo, and now I'm daydreaming of spring in my new backyard garden.

My favourite medium is linoleum block printing, especially blind embossed prints (deeply impressed and printed without ink). I'm about to embark on a watercolour adventure, and I'm wondering how that will find its way into my printmaking....

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Happy 2012!

New Sunflowers print - Artist's proofs.
I don't know about you, but I'm happy to wave good-bye to 2011.  It was a year of challenges, and of starts and stops, and some health scares (for me and a couple of people dear to me).  Thankfully, all is good in that department.

On the positive side, Tuckamore Design had a good year - about the same financially as 2010, but it felt like more progress was made on Etsy and locally.  There were some really cool highlights, like having repeat customers (love that!) and breaking out of the artist's block that kept me away from my studio for months.

I finally printed a black and white image that I was happy with, after messing with several ideas for what seemed like ages.  I also satisfied my curiousity about hand-colouring those images (the consensus was that they looked better in B&W!).

2012 will be a busy year for me on several fronts including printmaking.  I'm compiling massive to-do lists, refusing to call them "resolutions" because I never keep those.  But I can eventually work my way through a to-do list. 

What my dining room looks like, from October to Christmas
At the top of the 2012 list is to re-take a lot of photos for my website and my Etsy shop.  I have a lovely new camera and cannot wait to try it out...as soon as the sun comes out, that is.

I'd also like to focus more on wholesale and online sales, less on shows.  I only did two this year - Women's Gifts and the Last Minute Panic Sale at the Western New York Book Arts Center. 

I'd love to do both of those shows again.  But I'm going to be selective about doing any more than that.  Shows are a lot of work.  I always end up with way more stock than I need just to make a 3x6' table look reasonably full.  

I had my work at the Niagara Holiday Market this year, thanks to 464 Gallery.  I haven't heard about sales yet, but that was a new type of venue for me.  I'd love to get my work into more retail outlets and galleries.

Wising everyone a healthy, peaceful, and productive New Year!
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