The brief for fabric week was florals, which was lovely and you could also include the birds from the previous week.

When I started this brief I found that it was quite difficult for me. I normally design cute, quite colourful work and the mood board I had selected for the home decor course had fairly muted and quite sophisticated colours. I found it hard, as I kept wanting to add cute birds or quirky characters, but I was trying to achieve a more grown up look. It took a bit of getting used to.

At this stage I also felt I should be doing a more painterly style, as this is big in home decor at the moment. But having not painted for a good few years, it was kind of scary, so I stayed with my normal style of hand drawing everything and then live tracing in illustrator, apart from the bird canvas on the left hand side that was done with watercolour paints.

I was pleased with the final designs, but also felt frustrated, as i knew it should have been more painterly...