First weekend of Hampshire Open Studios 2015

This is how my studio looked just before I flung the doors open on Saturday morning.


I made coffee. I drank it. I painted.

Just after midday, my first visitors arrived... Impressively, they had come all the way from Swindon. To "do the Cleres".  That's Highclere, Old Burghclere and Kingsclere. There's a not-old Burghclere, but there isn't an open studio there. And there is only one studio in each Clere...

I just happen to have a map that I made on Google Maps showing all of these venues (and a few more):


Two more visitors arrived at 4:30, and that was it for Saturday - apart from the painting.

Today, I had 11 visitors. And there was another painting, which will get posted when I have a decent photograph of it!

It's always lovely to welcome visitors into the studio (paintings are for looking at, after all), even if I only sold one postcard all weekend. I'm always impressed that people make the effort to come and see me - a lone painter, the only open studio in the village - and a fair old way from, well, nearly anywhere, really.

What is nice about the location of the studio is that it is fairly central within the village and I get a few happenstance visitors who weren't following the booklet, some of whom have never visited an open studio before. It's all about raising the profile, after all... 

Because it's school holidays, I'm not open until next weekend. It's a bank holiday weekend, and on the Bank Holiday Monday, the church fête is happening down the road. I'm hoping for a few more happenstance visitors...