Red & Orange Tropical Flower Glow is a watercolor study for possibly a larger watercolor painting. It is on a thick, 300lb rough watercolor paper. Normally I don’t paint on ‘rough’ surface paper so that said, this is a very true contemporary watercolor—though it’s highly realistic, it’s painted very freely, with a lot of layers and vibrant tropical colors.

The torn edges add a lovely element to this painting. Watercolor has always been my first love. I’ve been painting in watercolor for much of my professional career. Though galleries have largely preferred oils I’ve stuck with this exquisite medium through the years, showing them alongside my oil paintings and sometimes exclusively.

My first watercolors were painted at age 11 and I painted exclusively in watercolor for the first 20 years of my painting life. My floral paintings are inspired by tropical flowers. I travel to the Hawaiian Islands most every year and we also grow tropical flowers in my California home garden.

Lauren Shelby— www.spaceswithin.com

Athena Charis—www.athenacharis.com

Diane Nicolson—www.pbd.org

Tim Manning—web.me.com/timothydmanning

Davis Dalbok—Living Green

Jenny Floravita (me)—floravitalights.com

Susan Crane—Bloom Artistry (floral arrangements)

The following evening was the actual dinner for those who purchased seats at 500 and tables at 5,000 and up. Click on the images to view larger and scroll through the entire portfolio.

Finally I’ve had a chance to “process” all of my photos from the 2012 Dining By Design event. Our (IFDA) table scape was one of the best! We definitely had a lot of energy in this space and a lot of time and thought went into our Pirates-of-the-Caribbean-meets-Lost theme.

Dining by Design is a national AIDs fundraiser. The event was held at the San Francisco Design Center Galleria.

Click on the photos above to view larger versions.

The photos that I’ve provided here on my website don’t do these lamps justice. I hope, in time, to learn to photograph the true illuminated beauty of these special lamps.

I hand-craft my glass shades here in my studio. A lot goes into each of these reverse painted lamp shades before I begin painting. Even hardware components at the top need to be specially machined here in my studio for these lamps.

The beauty is that these hand painted lamp shades can fit over other bases—for example, an antique base that’s been in the family—as I can provide the hardware that holds the glass.

This particular Tiffany style lamp stands 27″ tall. When they are illuminated, a special glow fills the surrounding area. My rooms feel empty without these lights turned on! I love the splashes of vibrant color and the warmth of the light…so much nicer than I can show here in a photograph. I’m now working to have a few extra reverse painted lamp shades on hand so that I don’t have to ever let go of my only lamps again.

One week from tomorrow this tropical flower mural will be installed at the San Francisco Design Center for the 2011 Dining By Design charity fundraiser.

I think this wall will feel empty after this painting’s release…and I think it’s time to complete a few more tropical flower paintings to show in it’s place…

My reverse painted chandeliers offer me a large glass canvas to freely paint flowers and mix colors. On the other hand, the night lights only gave a limited amount of space in which to capture my ideas. At first I tried to capture big sections of my chandeliers and compress them into my small glass shapes and that did produce some interesting and original painted night lights that took too long to paint (for what I was charging—keep in mind I cut, slump and cold work each glass shape and in those days I was also creating the backing that attaches to the fixture).

Certain subjects were a hit right away and I continue to offer those in my collection. Others were truly one-of-a-kind and the collectors who purchased those particular pieces got a great deal!

Because each hand painted night light is truly original and unique in it’s own way—no two could possibly be alike—and I allow myself a certain freedom in how I paint them, I don’t post each and every “new” night light that is created on my website. It would simply take too long to do so. A good friend who designs unique jewelery pieces said this, “it’s a grab ‘em while you can get ‘em situation” and that is so true because I’m inspired to create and paint my night lights in batches. When I’m focusing on my chandelier commissions I’m usually not creating night lights.

I am not a production artist so I will continue to paint unique night lights and I’ll continue to allow myself to veer off from my designs and color schemes and yes, some night lights that were “hits” will eventually no longer be offered. After all, I’m an innovative artist and I have to be interested and inspired to create truly unique works! It’s just how it is and I’m true to my work.

In fact, most of the summer season was spent working on commissions. Don’t get me wrong—I love commissions but it’s also very gratifying as an artist to create original works that are ‘new’.

This reverse painted chandelier is inspired by the large 36″ original, Romantic Summer Garden, only it has rose colors throughout and no sky blues. It features roses and peonies flowers. This is a very, very lovely piece in person and I look forward to photographing this work and adding it to my collection on my website.

There will be a preview and taste party. Patrons will bid on the ‘tables’ and then winners will come back on the following night with their dinner party guests to feast. This is a wonderful event and proceeds go to help the AIDS community.

The Preview Party: Table Hop & Taste is Wednesday, November 16, 6—11pm and tickets are 100. Cuisine will be provided by: 25 Lusk, Bar Bambino, Barbara Llewellyn Catering, Bisou, Chef Tyler Stone, Limon and Mission Minis. To order tickets, click here. Stay tuned for event photos!

On the other hand my husband is good at living in the “now”. In fact, he excels at it. He’s always working in our lush tropical yard or working on some section of the house or garage improving this or building that… He has a better natural balance in the art of living life in the now. People who are naturally good at this probably have to be born with this trait while others need to concentrate more on the ‘now’ to bring it into their lives.

In the last home that I owned in Santa Cruz I had make a couple improvements that were easy and yet they added a certain quality of life that was, well, nice. The problem was that I didn’t do this until I had decided to sell my home and move back to the Bay Area outskirts. It definitely occurred to me that I could have been living with these improvements all along and I would have really enjoyed them. This was one of those lessons that stays with you——not that I learn these lessons well enough as I promptly went back to focusing my business on the future…so it’s good that I have my husband to help keep us current.

That reminds me, I should go out to my yard and enjoy the scent of the last plumeria and ginger blossoms while they last…

With the next session I will tackle the rest of the background and perhaps the bottom sections as well. This phase is a preliminary background. Once the entire background fills my canvas I will paint more sunlight colors, more layers of palm fronds in greater contrast and I will bring in more extreme highlights. What I will be looking to create next is a balance of color and contrast.

I decided that in this painting that I want my background to have more designer colors and hues to make the piece more sophisticated. Tropcals can be in danger of looking cheesy if not done with thought. I give credit to the tiki era of the 50s and 60s for creating a sort of faux visual culture that represents the Hawaiian Islands. For the last decade of my painting career I have striven to paint tropicals with the same sophistication as any other subject that collectors would find worthy enough to hang as an original on their walls, in any room of their house. Given the fact that this mural is for an interior design project and the fact that it is brimming with brightly colored flowers, I wanted to create some decor balance considering the people who will be viewing this work. Most of the people who will see this mural installed will have very urban sensibilities and will likely enjoy very contemporary spaces.

Tropicals can add a beauty and a sense of feung shui to a space that brings feelings of relaxation, happiness, peacefulness and growth.

The image below shows how my first background color mix without palm fronds.