I have to admit to thinking about Christmas already. I know it is only just September but I have just been getting quotes from printers for Christmas cards to be printed from my personalised card designs. I have been sending out a family card as a seasonal greeting since the 1980s and each year many of our friends check that we’re sending them out again. Some even collect them! They are a kind of record of our progress as a family, though some are pure fantasy – like the one that portrayed us as superheroes after we ate radioactive mince pies.

I have also been doing greetings cards for other families, and that’s intriguing for me as I see the family develop, and the family get to let their friends and family know about their progress and achievements in a colourful and humorous way.

If anyone is interested in knowing more about this service and would like to take advantage of a 10% discount on orders placed before September 30th, please get in touch.

Bespoke Business Christmas Cards

With our dismal summer gradually fading and the nights drawing in I’ve been having to plan my timetable for personalised Christmas card preparation, getting printing quotes, locating envelopes, informing potential customers in time for design discussion, execution, printing and early delivery for addressing and labelling. It’s never too early to start.

Christmas is traditionally the time of year that people in business take the opportunity to say thank you to their customers and to remind them of their services for the year ahead. A memorable and interesting seasonal card catches the attention and stands out from the regular cards showing snow scenes and robins on post boxes.

A festive card with colour and humour, depicting staff and/or services, can amuse and interest the client and will be memorable. With the cost of quality cards in the shops as high as they are it makes sense to have a bespoke design that promotes the business, adds the personal touch and makes a statement.

I have been getting quotes from printers and I can either just draw and paint a card design from the brief a business gives me and return that for the business to email, self-print or have printed, or I can work out a package price for Christmas delivery.

I have done corporate seasonal cards for businesses as diverse as: couriers, dentists, accountants, radio stations, till manufactures, opticians, dating agencies, letting agencies, roofers, engineers, garage door manufacturers, IT consultants, vitamin manufacturing companies, printers, insurers, cleaning services, florists and an Oscar award-winning motion control camera manufacturing company, amongst others.

If anyone is interested in knowing more about this service and would like to take advantage of a 10% discount on orders placed before September 30th, please get in touch.

Last weekend I took part in a 6-a-side football tournament (we reached the semi-final, but we lost to the eventual winners) and I was asked to draw a caricature of the Arsenal Football Club’s manager, Arsene Wenger, as a logo for our team The Wenger Rejects. (As it happens Arsene could probably have used us that day as Arsenal went down 8-2 to Man Utd.)

Alex Ferguson Caricature

As I worked on it I also practised on other celebrity caricatures and was reminded again how tricky it can sometimes be to

capture the essence of a person. Arsene was relatively easy but I struggled with Manchester United’s manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, until I got one I was happy with.

I have done a few celebrity caricatures over the years including one of Sir Richard Branson in preparation for a live appearance at a party, one of Sol Campbell when he was a Spurs player, a group caricature of The Who, and most recently Roger Federer as a tennis opponent for a private client.

I also draw pencil portraits and did a series of six detectives (Poirot, Morse, Barnaby, Frost, Marple and Foyle) for a client who is, like me, a fan of TV crime fiction (the gentler kind).

At the start of the year I drew a multi-character caricature, as a staff member leaving present, for a large, London based construction company. There was one major and eighteen minor characters to incorporate into the design and I really enjoyed doing it.

Multi-Character Caricature for Company Calendar

I’ve done several multi-character caricatures and it’s particularly gratifying when get a good result because lots of people are pleased at the same time.

Though some people are harder to caricature than others, given two or three up-to date photos that are good likenesses of the subject I can get a good result in all cases.

The word caricature, often misspelt as charicature, does not come from character, as I assumed, but basically means ‘loaded portrait’ and is, according to Wikipedia, ‘a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness’.

I’ve always enjoyed the work of British caricaturists, and I have modern collections of the 18th and 19th century artists such as Thomas Rowlandson, James Gillray and George Cruickshank. Though not classified as a caricaturist, as he generally captured true likeness in his engravings and paintings of political commentary, William Hogarth is my favourite artist and he did do some excellent caricatures.

Growing up in 1960s I admired the work of Ralph Steadman, Willie Rushton and Gerald Scarfe though I found them rather savage and I tended toward the gentler styles of American artists like Mort Drucker and Jack Davis, whose work appeared in Mad magazine.

The Who - Group Caricature

In the 1980s and 90s Spitting Image brought caricature into 3D on TV and had huge effect on some politicians careers. Today newspapers generally carry a cartoon of political caricature. Christian Adams in the Telegraph is one of my favourites.

I have done some political caricatures and cartoons of a more gentle nature and a few celebrity caricatures – I did a 60s version of The Who that I was pleased with – though the majority of my work tends to be personal and corporate caricatures for gifts, either individual or group caricatures.

Welcome! I am pleased to announce that I have just launched my new website. It’s full of content, including my services, prices and portfolio.

If you have any projects that you need a cartoonist or illustrator, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I am also on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn so feel free to connect with me on any of these portals.

I am currently offering a 10% discount on Christmas Card Designs, so book now to avoid the season rush and have your Christmas card standout from the rest!