Becca is now at DUKKI

Becca Thorne Illustration is now at Dukki

Several flat head screws, some elbow grease and a dodgy spirit level later, We finally managed to adorn the wall of our DUKKI shop, with Becca’s beautiful linoprints.

Becca has produced several framed pieces, based on curios found in the landscape from parts of the UK.

Her work has transformed the space, and we’re loving having something different for our customers to feast their eyes on!

Along with her framed work, there is she also has some mounted editions, and some silk screened bags. My favourite is the Chihuawizard!

Becca will be exhibiting until the 29th March, so make sure you come and see her bright and beautiful pieces. if you would like to find out more about Becca’s background and portfolio please click on the link here.  You can follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

Details of the full line up for the DUKKI Showcase 2015 can be found below, or by clicking on this link.

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It’s a bleddeh cob, Duck!

Or is it?

Have you had this discussion before?

It’s a great debate that has caused controversy for years, and continues to do so to this day.
If you come from Nottingham, bread rolls are called  ‘Cobs.’ I grew up on the Rutland/ Leicestershire border and they were definitely always called cobs there ; yet travel to Merseyside and it’s a ‘Nudger’ and in parts of Scotland they’re ‘bannocks’ or ‘butteries’.

To most people, a cob is either a female horse, or an ancient building material, made with straw and clay. But in Nottingham, its a thing you ask yer mam ter get yer frum th bakereh!

On the other hand, if yer Nanar’s gorra cob on, then it means she’s probably in a bad mood…

The name for a bread roll varies depending on where you travel in the UK, and that one word can be key to people telling where you’re from in an instant. I always remember visiting friends in Lancashire, and being offered a ‘teacake’ to put my chips in; being too polite to say no, I was wondering whether it would have currants in! Disappointingly, it was just a cob (sorry, bread roll!)

If you go daan saaf, and ask for a sausage roll, it’s quite likely that you’ll be given a roll with a couple of sausages in, and perhaps a bit of red sauce. If you ask for a sausage roll in the East Midlands, you’ll be presented with the pastry variety! This begs the question, what do they call sausage rolls in the south of England? It’s too bleddeh confusing!

Anyway, if you’d like to join the debate, please feel free to share this post, and comment on what you call this bready lump of carbohydrates!

Next time you’re in a bakery, in unfamiliar territories, it’s probably best to just point at what you want and ask for “one of those”.

If you want any of our #itsacob products, you can visit our shop in the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre, or visit www.dukkigifts.co.uk

DUKKI Showcase – Introducing Becca Thorne: Illustration

It’s time for us to introduce our next exhibitor in the DUKKI Showcase 2015!

Becca is an illustrator and printmaker based in Beeston, where she works at home in her spare room studio creating hand printed pieces in linocut, silkscreen and wood engraving. Originally from the Forest of Dean, she studied BA and MA Illustration at Falmouth College of Arts on the south Cornwall coast, graduating in 2004/05 respectively.

 The majority of Becca’s illustration work is linocut, burnished with a teaspoon and printed with water-based inks, which dry faster than traditional oil-based mediums, allowing for longer to be spent on designing and cutting and less on waiting for inks to dry. Some more colourful illustrations, which require several printed layers, might be pieced together digitally for speed and accuracy, but she still uses more traditional and unpredictable techniques when the situation allows.

Becca’s style lends itself well to historical illustration and, as such, she is often requested to create period-specific imagery for clients such as BBC History Magazine and The Folio Society.

A love of nature inspires much of her personal work, especially the beautiful and wild areas she’s lived and travelled, from British beaches to New Zealand mountains, and this continues to inform and inspire her practice, as does the work of printmakers such as Sybil Andrews, Lill Tschudi, Cyril Edward Power and Medieval woodcutters and illuminators.

 Becca’s been illustrating professionally since 2008, working for a wide variety of clients including National Trust Books, Sight & Sound Magazine, HarperCollins, The Earth Island Journal, Compassionate Dorset, YSC, GQ Magazine, Anchor Canada and Rugby Borough Council to name but a few. She also tutors part-time on the Graphic Design with Illustration degree course at DeMontfort University.

Becca will be exhibiting her latest collection of prints, from 15-29 March.

You can find her on Twitter and Instagram as @BeThorney and on  Facebook at Becca Thorne: Illustration

Nottingham Street Tales: Drury Hill

An absolutely fascinating article, about a long lost but not forgotten Medieval thoroughfare. Now the entrance to the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre, not far from our shop!

Nottingham Hidden History Team

by Joe Earp

Drury Hill if it had existed today would have most certainly rivalled York’s very own Shambles as one of the most important and picturesque examples of a medieval thoroughfare. However Drury Hill was not to be and despite many protests the ancient thoroughfare was demolished in the 1960s to make way for the entrance to the then new Broad Marsh Shopping Centre.

Drury Hill, with its narrowness and congestion, and its curious haphazard buildings, gives us a good impression of what medieval Nottingham would have looked like. Drury Hill was 4ft 10 inches wide at its narrowest point and signs had to be posted to alert traffic to this hazard. Drury Hill was so narrow that it was said that at its narrowest people from the two adjacent buildings could reach over and join hands.

Drury Hill, Nottingham, circa 1906- Photo Credit: The Paul Nix Collection.

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DUKKI Showcase – The Full Line up!

An exhibition in a Shopping Centre? Wharrever next, me duck?

Well thats exactly what is happening here at DUKKI, in the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre.

For the next ten months, we will be opening our doors to new artists, illustrators and designers. After having been given this fantastic opportunity from the Inspiring Retail Nottingham team, to open a shop in the Broadmarsh Shopping centre; we thought it fitting to help promote other creative people. Nottingham is an amazing city, and we want to help promote it. There is such a diverse mix of creative people, which we wanted to tap into and what better way to do this, than offering the a free space in our Nottingham themed shop!

All ten artists have been hand picked for their unique styles which cover a wide variety of techniques and processes. We invited people to apply for the showcase, and were amazed by the response we had.

We will be hosting a different exhibition for the last two weeks of each month, and our very own resident artist Ian Jones will be kick-starting the event with a series of his street art pieces.

We will be introducing each Artist, in the run up to their exhibition through our Blog site. We hope you can make it down to see all this wonderful talent, and help us bring something new to the usual conventions of a Shopping Centre.

 Here is the full line up:

15th – 28th February – Ian Jones Art and Illustration 

Ian is already resident artist at DUKKI, so we thought it fitting to showcase some of his other styles of working. His work is a blend of traditional and digital techniques resulting in richly layered textural images.
The images that he produces bridge the gap between abstract and figurative painting, creating a landscape that simultaneously reflects reality and fantasy.

 @nonsenseprophet      

15th – 29th March – Becca Thorne Illustration

Becca is an illustrator based in Beeston. She works from her studio at home, and creates hand printed pieces in linocut, silk screen and wood engraving. Her lino work is burnished with a teaspoon, and then printed using water-based inks. She has worked with a wide variety of clients, including BBC History Magazine, The Folio Society, HarperCollins and National Trust Books to name a few.

@BeThorney

18th – 30th April – Farah Batool Art

We first came across Farah’s beautiful ceramic jewellery in the Handmade Nottingham pop up shop,  so we were delighted when she agreed to exhibit some of her work at DUKKI. Her work is delicate and intricate. She is inspired by nature and her work has a clear technique that is prevalent in all of her pieces.

 @farahbatoolart

17th – 31st May – Beatrice Roberts Contemporary Folk Art

Beatrice is a wonderful Nottingham based artist, whose work is offbeat, vigourous and full of colour and humour. Working in mixed media, She creates primitive style artwork which has a rough, raw, naivety. She is also a writer for Creative Nottingham

@BeatriceMArtist

17th – 30th June – Photogra-Fix Professional Photographic Restoration

Tom Marshall, who runs PhotograFix, also happens to be  younger sibling to Heidi at DUKKI. He specialises in painstakingly colourising and restoring old Black and White photographs. Heidi has asked him to colourise a series of Old Nottingham photographs. Now based in Glasgow, Tom is originally from the East Midlands.

@PhotograFixUK

18th – 31st July – Burning Sensations Pyrography

Pyrography, the art of decorating wood with burn marks, to create patterns or images using a sharp poker-like implement. Liz Caley is a Pyrography Artist. She has been burning pictures & sayings onto wooden items for 16 years. She will be displaying some of her boxes, trinkets and other items during her exhibit at DUKKI.

 

16th – 31st August – Mel Graham Artist

Mel Graham is an artist, covered in paint, and overflowing with ideas. Her most favourite subject to paint is the sea, but ridiculously she couldn’t live further from it in land-locked Nottingham, UK!

@artbymelgraham

19th – 30th September – Oliver Lovley Artist -TBC

Well what can we say? Oliver Lovley’s watercolour depictions of local architecture and people are quite simply – Lovely! His pieces have an ethereal quality to them, and his figures seem to flow from the page. A truly beautiful and unique style.

@OliverLovley

17th – 31st October – Rikki Marr Art & Design

Rikki is a regular Illustrator for Left Lion Magazine, and works on lots of exciting projects all over the world. He also has a digital comic available to av a goz at here Bendigo vs Nottingham

@RikkiMarr 

15th – 30th November – Katie Abey Design

Katie Abey is an illustrator living in a crazy little house in with her boyfriend, Jeff, and their cat, Frank.  She is inspired by anything weird and wonderful and  aims to put happiness and humour into all of her illustrations and make people smile.  Her distinctive style is full of quirkiness. You can click on any of the images to see her full portfolio.

@Katie Abey

well, you’ve made it to the end! We hope you have enjoyed reading about all the different artists and designers coming our way. We’re really excited to be giving something back to the people of Nottingham and helping to promote local artists. Be sure to pop down to DUKKI Upper Level, Broadmarsh Shopping Centre, Nottingham.

Follow us on Facebook and Twitter too!

Ta-ra for now, me ducks!

DUKKI Showcase – Introducing Ian Jones Art and Illustration

We thought it fitting to kickstart the ‘Dukki Showcase’ with our very own resident Artist Ian Jones.

  

Whilst Ian has created artwork based on the local landmarks of Nottingham for us at DUKKI, he has primarily created a large portfolio of Street Art, some of which he will be exhibiting at DUKKI this month.

Ian Jones is an Artist and Illustrator, born and raised in Chilwell, Nottingham. He has been a professional illustrator for the last 7 years and studied Graphic Design at the Lace Market School of Art and Design.

His work is a blend of traditional and digital techniques resulting in richly layered textural images.

  

The images that he produces bridge the gap between abstract and figurative painting, creating a landscape that simultaneously reflects reality and fantasy.

Ian’s main Artistic influences are Mythology, Shamanism, Graffiti and Tribal Art, which is clearly reflected in the colour palette that he uses.

When he isn’t helping to run Dukki in the Broadmarsh, Ian is always busy creating new pieces of artwork and posting them on Twitter and Instagram, under the handle @nonsenseprophet.

His work has been displayed in galleries across the midlands, and a large proportion of his Nottingham Landmarks can be found already in DUKKI in the Broadmarsh.

Ian is an avid believer that there is something very pure about creating work digitally. He says “you are in effect painting with light, with electricity, manipulating and sculpting that which isn’t truly tangible.”

You can find Ian’s facebook page here, and follow him for the latest updates of his work.

Ian’s exhibition will start on Sunday 15^th February and run until the end of the month.

A full list of the exhibitors taking part in the showcase, can be found here.

Next month we will be introducing Becca Thorne Illustration

Halloween and happy outcomes

The last few days have been rather hectic since I pitched to the ‘dragons’ at Inspiring Retail.
There have been Halloween parties,

a whole lot of cakes,

and a successful days trading at Barton’s PLC on Sunday. 

But by far the most exciting thing to happen was the awards ceremony for the Inspiring retail awards 2014.
The morning of that day didn’t start too well. After hosting a party at the Lace Market Theatre for Halloween,  I had been vacuuming the club room at 1 am on sunday, dressed as Morticia Adams. Followed by a busy market on the Sunday. So when it came to being bright eyed and bushy tailed the next day, it was a bit of a challenge.

Firstly, we had an ordeal getting Little Aud’s ‘cone of shame’ back on, that she had pulled off in the night. She then proceeded to do a Tazmanian devil impression around the house in retaliation. Knocking several items of stock over that we had prepared to take.
I then discovered that the heel had come off the pair of shoes I was going to wear, so there was a mad dash to buy the cheapest black shoes available. 
When we finally arrived at the Council House in Market Square,  it was magnificent.  I had never been inside before and seen the city from that perspective.

We set up the table for display, and mingled with the other delegates. The previous winners were there, and several local business owners.
I had brought an entourage with me, consisting of family and friends.of course, Ian Jones was there in partnership with me, showing off some of the amazing pieces he had produced for me to sell.
David Hargreaves from Fisher Hargreaves Proctor started the ball rolling with the speeches, and a little bit was shown about each of the 8 candidates,  myself included.  I felt strangely nonplussed by the whole experience prior to the announcements,  perhaps because I didn’t want to get my hopes up. But when David got to announce the winners, of which there would be two; I began to feel a bit sick.
I had worked so hard for this moment and the reality of it was all just sinking in.
My name was called. Stunned silence from me and cheering from my Mum and Dad! Ian pushed me to stand up, because I was still in stock. I’ve never even won a raffle before…

I am so proud of my achievements.  I’ve only been trading since April,  but I wasn’t going to let my redundancy back then, turn into complacency now. I know the idea I have fits a gap in the market and this competition will be the turning point in making a success story of it.
I’d like to thank the dragons (whom weren’t really dragons) for believing in me, and Inspiring Retail for giving me this opportunity.  I will be appearing in the Nottingham Post today, and featured on Notts TV last night. All this is so surreal. As I sit here writing this, with a cup of tea and Little Aud (whom has pulled off her collar again) I am so grateful for everyone that has helped me on this journey. This is proof that you should never give up, even when you’re feeling like it’s not worth getting up in the morning. Just keep going. Never give up. It’s taken me 31 years to realise what I am supposed to be doing with my life. Now I’m going to ‘gerron wee it, duck!’

‘Dukki’ will be opening for business on 1st December 2014, but you can currently buy our stock via http://www.dukkidesign.co.uk/shop
Follow us @dukkigifts and @dukkidesign

Ta ra for now!