Katherine Tromans Illustration

Happy Sunday!~ continuing our scenes – Tokyo side street, Japan.

Enjoying painting busy scenes at the moment! I think it will be similar to the sort of scenes me and will have a go at drawing in November so, playing around with detail levels and colour palettes

Does anyone have any recommendations on watercolour sketchbooks? I love working on watercolour hot pressed paper and kind of thinking I may take some with me, if I figure a way to bind it myself (Unless I find a really good portable sketchbook!) any other portable stationery tips appreciated, or if you have any tips for Japanese/South Korean stationery shops we are all ears 👀 🖍️ ✏️ ✌️

~Kat

EQUAL + ABLE ~

It’s great to finally share some photos of the EQUAL + ABLE print guide, shot by Jack Spicer Adams 📸 ✨

A little bit about the branding:

At the start of Summer, my client launched their temporary exhibition ‘EQUAL + ABLE’ an exhibition that shines a light on ableism. The guide is made of contributions from the Collections Community Panel, who have each selected an artwork from the gallery’s collections that have resonated with them.

The artworks chosen each have a symbol and link to mental health (●) neurodiversity (✚) physical disability (=) and hidden disability (▲) and these are throughout the guide with the symbols being used as a placeholder for imagery and patterns.

The guide is available in A4 for accessibility too. EQUAL + ABLE runs until May 18th 2025.

Print

A few close-ups of Smethwick and Bearwood landmarks that I added into the latest Smethwick Arts Map and campaign 😊🐄 painted with watercolour and added Procreate watercolour and crayon brush elements 🖌️🖍️

The Smethwick Arts Map 🎭 3/4

Continuing with sharing more on this project~ Throughout July I was working with on their brand for ‘The Smethwick Arts,’ and their trail guide 🗺️

We designed their ‘The Smethwick Arts,’ brand with two sub-brands, ‘The Smethwick Arts Collective,’ and the ‘The Smethwick Arts Map,’ too so the brand had flex across their offering.

I constructed each with input from the BCT team Donna, Laura and Amrit. It was important that the brand was playful, fun and inclusive and appealed to the families and neighbourhood of Smethwick.
From Black Country Touring: Enhancing wellbeing through creative participation. Activities will include theatre shows for families, performances for adults, and nature-based participatory workshops for children. The project will run from early August to early December.’

This was a really fun brief to work across brand, lettering, map and illustration ~ all of my favourite design areas. I look forward to seeing the trail in action! Let me know if you spot any maps 🗺️😊

The Smethwick Arts 🎭 3/4

Continuing with sharing this project ~ I’ve been rather quiet on here lately so it’s lovely to share some new work!

Throughout July I was working with on their brand for The Smethwick Arts and their trail guide 🗺️

We designed their The Smethwick Arts brand with two sub-brands, The Smethwick Arts Collective and the The Smethwick Arts Map too so the brand had flex across their offering.

I constructed each with input from the BCT team Donna, Laura and Amrit. It was important that the brand was playful, fun and inclusive and appealed to the families and neighbourhood of Smethwick, from Black Country Touring ‘Enhancing wellbeing through creative participation. Activities will include theatre shows for families, performances for adults, and nature-based participatory workshops for children. The project will run from early August to early December.’

This was a really fun brief to work across brand, lettering, map and illustration ~ all of my favourite design areas. I look forward to seeing the trail in action! Let me know if you spot any maps 🗺️😊

The Smethwick Arts 🎭 2/4

I’ve been rather quiet over here, so it’s lovely to be able to share some of what I’ve been up to lately!

Throughout July I was working with on their brand for The Smethwick Arts and their trail guide 🗺️

We designed their The Smethwick Arts brand with two sub-brands, The Smethwick Arts Collective and the The Smethwick Arts Map too so the brand had flex across their offering.

I constructed each with input from the BCT team Donna, Laura and Amrit. It was important that the brand was playful, fun and inclusive and appealed to the families and neighbourhood of Smethwick, from Black Country Touring ‘Enhancing wellbeing through creative participation. Activities will include theatre shows for families, performances for adults, and nature-based participatory workshops for children. The project will run from early August to early December.’

This was a really fun brief to work across brand, map and illustration ~ all of my favourite design areas. I look forward to seeing the trail in action! Let me know if you spot any maps 🗺️😊

The Smethwick Arts 🎭 1/4

I’ve been rather quiet over here, so it’s lovely to be able to share some of what I’ve been up to lately!

Throughout July I was working with on their brand for The Smethwick Arts and their trail guide 🗺️

We designed their The Smethwick Arts brand with two sub-brands, The Smethwick Arts Collective and the The Smethwick Arts Map too so the brand had flex across their offering.

I constructed each with input from the BCT team Donna, Laura and Amrit. It was important that the brand was playful, fun and inclusive and appealed to the wide families and neighbourhood of Smethwick, from Black Country Touring ‘Enhancing wellbeing through creative participation. Activities will include theatre shows for families, performances for adults, and nature-based participatory workshops for children. The project will run from early August to early December.’

This was a really fun brief to work across brand, map and illustration ~ all of my favourite design areas. I look forward to seeing the trail in action! Let me know if you spot any maps 🗺️😊

New work for Odyssey ~ a watercolour for one of their print brochures 🖌️ I tried to work with bringing the maroon and lime colours from the brand into the watercolour while staying true to the colours of the historic building at Marylebone. A beautiful building to paint ✨

Some of the brand and print work I’ve been working on for all lined up ✨ I love working with the gallery and the community panel.

Equal + Able ~ This is the current temporary exhibition until June 2025 on ableism. (Case study coming soon!)
The Joy Project ~ The gallery’s youth panel, giving creative space to those aged 16-24 who wish to get involved with the gallery
Garman-Ryan at 50 ~ A celebration of the permanent collection at New Art Gallery Walsall. Project in collaboration with

A closer look at some of the details in my map for 2024 ✨🍸🎉

It’s the 10th anniversary of the 🥳🍸🎈and today is the last day to catch the festival around the city at over 42 venues.

It was great to be invited back this year to illustrate the map for its birthday event. One of my first ever maps was for Birmingham Cocktail Weekend back in 2018 🗺️

A side street in Kyoto, from one of my old Japan photos when I visited before 🇯🇵
It’s just over 4 months until me and go to Japan so getting prepared and doing some sketching and painting in prep 💥✌️looking forward to doing some painting out there!
Have any followers been? If so what are your highlights? 🏯

The Joy Project ~ 🌞✨💖💥😊 (Post 2/2)

I recently had the pleasure of working with on the branding for their collection’s youth panel, ‘The Joy Project’ the project extends to all local 16-24 year olds interested in art and their first project is to create an exhibition for the gallery’s 25th birthday, which is coming up soon.
The project will be led by those young people involved, providing a safe space where all feel included and can enjoy socialising
With the branding I chose to illustrate the lettering to feel friendly and embody the values of the project, discussed with Julie at New Art Gallery Walsall. There was a focus on the positives but also to shake things up within the gallery space ~ I particularly love the notion of being creative with disruption 💥 The icons signify each of the values within the project, which in turn are used as graphic devices throughout their print and digital launch material.
Looking forward to revealing more as the project develops 💫

The Joy Project ~ 🌞✨💖💥😊

Happy Friday all! a positive project reveal today seeing as it’s pretty sunny 😎

I recently had the pleasure of working with on the branding for their collection’s youth panel, ‘The Joy Project’ the project extends to all local 16-24 year olds interested in art and their first project is to create an exhibition for the gallery’s 25th birthday, which is coming up soon.
The project will be led by those young people involved, providing a safe space where all feel included and can enjoy socialising
With the branding I chose to illustrate the lettering to feel friendly and embody the values of the project, discussed with Julie at New Art Gallery Walsall. There was a focus on the positives but also to shake things up within the gallery space ~ I particularly love the notion of being creative with disruption 💥 The icons signify each of the values within the project, which in turn are used as graphic devices throughout their print and digital launch material.
Looking forward to revealing more as the project develops 💫

Koala A4 Print - All Profits to WWF's Australian Wildlife and Nature Recovery Fund

🐨 A4 prints with all proceeds going to WWF 🐨

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Hey everyone, with the Australian bushfires far from over, I thought I’d do my part with creating a charity piece to help raise funds for the recovery. I noticed a few artists doing similar charity pieces and I wanted to help too.

**** They have a price of £13.50 which will be donated to the WWF Australian Wildlife and Nature Recovery Fund. 😊🐨 ****

Link to purchase here: https://etsy.me/2v4xcQe

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This is what it will cover (Taken from the WWF website):
• Wildlife response - including partnering with wildlife response organisations, communities and scientists nationally for a swift and effective response and recovery at scale.

• Habitat restoration for people and nature - including restoring forests and damaged wildlife habitat, stopping deforestation, including cultivating habitat connectivity, core habitat and Indigenous and rural fire management.

• Future-proofing Australia - including driving innovative solutions to help mitigate climate change, driving climate preparedness, species adaptation and long-term wildlife and nature conservation efforts towards securing Australia’s natural resources for people and nature

Thank you!

etsy.com This is an A4 digital colour print of a Koala in the Australian Bush. I chose to illustrate this to try and raise funds for WWFs Australian Wildlife and Nature Recovery Fund. Sale price of the piece will be donated to the WWF - £13.50. The postage amount of £1.50 for transparency is to cover posta...